National-Regional Joint Engineering Research Center for Soil Pollution Control and Remediation in South China, Guangdong Key Laboratory of Integrated Agro-environmental Pollution Control and Management, Institute of Eco-environmental and Soil Sciences, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510650, China.
Engineering and Technology Research Center for Agricultural Land Pollution Prevention and Control of Guangdong Higher Education Institutes, College of Resources and Environment, Zhongkai University of Agriculture and Engineering, Guangzhou 510225, China.
J Hazard Mater. 2022 May 15;430:128390. doi: 10.1016/j.jhazmat.2022.128390. Epub 2022 Jan 30.
The increasing use of plastic film mulching has caused the accumulation of plastic film residue in soil. To date, most researches on the plastisphere have focused on bacterial and fungal communities, with few on protistan community, especially in terrestrial ecosystems. To understand plastisphere protistan communities, we collected plastic film residues from plastic-mulching croplands. The plastisphere significantly altered the alpha-diversity, structure, and composition of taxonomic and functional (consumers, phototrophs, and parasites) communities. In both the plastisphere and surrounding soil, although some consumers dominated the protistan community network, while their performance was weakened by mulch application. The ecological networks of the plastisphere community presented higher modularity, less complexity, and a lower proportion of positive connections than the networks of surrounding soil. In addition, the enriched plant pathogens (e.g., Spongospora) and keystone taxa classified as plant pathogens (e.g., Pythium) in the plastisphere imply that plastic film residues may pose a risk to soil health and plant performance. Neutral-based processes dominated the assembly of the plastisphere protistan communities, whereas niche-based processes governed the protistan community assembly of surrounding soil. This study reveals that plastic film residues generate a unique niche for protistan colonization, which disturbs protistan communities and threatens agricultural ecosystem health and function.
塑料薄膜覆盖的使用日益增加，导致土壤中塑料残片的积累。迄今为止，大多数关于塑料球层的研究都集中在细菌和真菌群落上，而对原生动物群落的研究较少，特别是在陆地生态系统中。为了了解塑料球层的原生动物群落，我们从塑料覆盖农田中收集了塑料残片。塑料球层显著改变了分类和功能（消费者、光合生物和寄生虫）群落的 alpha 多样性、结构和组成。在塑料球层和周围土壤中，尽管一些消费者主导着原生动物群落网络，但由于覆盖应用，它们的表现被削弱了。与周围土壤相比，塑料球层群落的生态网络具有更高的模块性、更低的复杂性和更低的正连接比例。此外，在塑料球层中富集的植物病原体（如海绵孢子）和被归类为植物病原体的关键类群（如腐霉）表明，塑料薄膜残片可能对土壤健康和植物性能构成风险。基于中性的过程主导着塑料球层原生动物群落的组装，而基于生态位的过程则控制着周围土壤中原生动物群落的组装。本研究揭示了塑料残片为原生动物定殖产生了一个独特的小生境，扰乱了原生动物群落，威胁着农业生态系统的健康和功能。
