Department of Marine Biology, Institute for Biological Sciences, University of Rostock, 18059 Rostock, Germany.
Departamento de Biología Marina, Facultad de Ciencias del Mar, Universidad Católica del Norte, Larrondo 1281, Coquimbo, Chile.
Mar Pollut Bull. 2022 Apr;177:113414. doi: 10.1016/j.marpolbul.2022.113414. Epub 2022 Mar 18.
Laboratory exposure studies allow to investigate the impact of microplastics on marine biota, but commonly lack a procedural control, i.e. assessing the effects of natural microparticles. In two experiments with the mussel Semimytilus algosus, we compared the effects of clay vs. polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and celite vs. polymethyl-methacrylate (PMMA), respectively, at concentrations of 1.5, 15 and 150 mg l. After more than 60 days, no effects on respiration and clearance rates, mortality and byssus strength were observed. However, in mussels exposed to PVC the Body Condition Index was 34% lower at 150 mg l than at 1.5 mg l. Furthermore, at 15 mg l, mussels exposed to microplastics produced over 40% less byssus than those exposed to natural microparticles. This suggests that mussels react differently to natural microparticles and to microplastics, but only at high particle loads that exceed current environmental microplastic concentrations by orders of magnitude.
实验室暴露研究允许研究微塑料对海洋生物的影响，但通常缺乏程序控制，即评估天然微粒的影响。在两项贻贝 Semimytilus algosus 的实验中，我们分别比较了粘土与聚氯乙烯（PVC）和硅藻土与聚甲基丙烯酸甲酯（PMMA）的影响，浓度分别为 1.5、15 和 150 mg/L。60 多天后，呼吸和清除率、死亡率和贻贝强度均未受到影响。然而，在暴露于聚氯乙烯的贻贝中，150 mg/L 时的身体状况指数比 1.5 mg/L 时低 34%。此外，在 15 mg/L 时，暴露于微塑料的贻贝产生的贻贝比暴露于天然微粒的贻贝少 40%以上。这表明贻贝对天然微粒和微塑料的反应不同，但仅在高颗粒负荷下才会发生，这种颗粒负荷超过当前环境中微塑料浓度的数量级。
