Tagg Alexander S, Sperlea Theodor, Labrenz Matthias, Harrison Jesse P, Ojeda Jesús J, Sapp Melanie
Leibniz-Institut für Ostseeforschung Warnemünde, Seestraße 15, 18119 Rostock, Germany.
Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Swansea University, Swansea SA1 8EN, UK.
Microorganisms. 2022 Sep 2;10(9):1775. doi: 10.3390/microorganisms10091775.
Microplastics are a globally-ubiquitous aquatic pollutant and have been heavily studied over the last decade. Of particular interest are the interactions between microplastics and microorganisms, especially the pursuit to discover a plastic-specific biome, the so-called plastisphere. To follow this up, a year-long microcosm experimental setup was deployed to expose five different microplastic types (and silica beads control) to activated aerobic wastewater in controlled conditions, with microbial communities being measured four times over the course of the year using 16S rDNA (bacterial) and ITS (fungal) amplicon sequencing. The biofilm community shows no evidence of a specific plastisphere, even after a year of incubation. Indeed, the microbial communities (particularly bacterial) show a clear trend of increasing dissimilarity between plastic types as time increases. Despite little evidence for a plastic-specific community, there was a slight grouping observed for polyolefins (PE and PP) in 6-12-month biofilms. Additionally, an OTU assigned to the genus was identified on many plastics, increasing over time while showing no growth on silicate (natural particle) controls, suggesting this could be either a slow-growing plastic-specific taxon or a symbiont to such. Both substrate-associated findings were only possible to observe in samples incubated for 6-12 months, which highlights the importance of studying long-term microbial community dynamics on plastic surfaces.
微塑料是一种全球普遍存在的水生污染物,在过去十年中受到了大量研究。特别令人感兴趣的是微塑料与微生物之间的相互作用,尤其是对发现特定于塑料的生物群落(即所谓的塑料圈)的探索。为了跟进此事,我们进行了为期一年的微观世界实验设置,在受控条件下将五种不同类型的微塑料(以及作为对照的硅珠)暴露于活性好氧废水中,在这一年的时间里使用16S rDNA(细菌)和ITS(真菌)扩增子测序对微生物群落进行了四次测量。即使经过一年的培养,生物膜群落也没有显示出特定塑料圈的迹象。事实上,随着时间的增加,微生物群落(尤其是细菌群落)在不同塑料类型之间显示出明显的差异增加趋势。尽管几乎没有证据表明存在特定于塑料的群落,但在6至12个月的生物膜中观察到聚烯烃(PE和PP)有轻微的分组现象。此外,在许多塑料上都鉴定出了一个属于某属的OTU,它随时间增加,而在硅酸盐(天然颗粒)对照上没有生长,这表明它可能是一种生长缓慢的特定于塑料的分类群,或者是其共生体。这两个与底物相关的发现只有在培养6至12个月的样本中才能观察到,这突出了研究塑料表面长期微生物群落动态的重要性。