Seidenath Dimitri, Holzinger Anja, Kemnitz Klara, Langhof Nico, Lücker Darleen, Opel Thorsten, Otti Oliver, Feldhaar Heike
Animal Population Ecology, Animal Ecology I, Bayreuth Center of Ecology and Environmental Research (BayCEER), University of Bayreuth, Bayreuth, Germany.
Department of Ceramic Materials Engineering, University of Bayreuth, Bayreuth, Germany.
Front Insect Sci. 2021 Oct 29;1:761881. doi: 10.3389/finsc.2021.761881. eCollection 2021.
Insects are integral to terrestrial life and provide essential ecosystem functions such as pollination and nutrient cycling. Due to massive declines in insect biomass, abundance, or species richness in recent years, the focus has turned to find their causes. Anthropogenic pollution is among the main drivers of insect declines. Research addressing the effects of pollutants concentrates on aquatic insects and pollinators, despite the apparent risk of contaminated soils. Pollutants accumulating in the soil might pose a significant threat because concentrations tend to be high and different pollutants are present simultaneously. Here, we exposed queens of the black garden ant at the colony founding stage to different concentrations and combinations of pollutants (brake dust, soot, microplastic particles and fibers, manure) to determine dose-dependent effects and interactions between stressors. As proxies for colony founding success, we measured queen survival, the development time of the different life stages, the brood weight, and the number of offspring. Over the course of the experiment queen mortality was very low and similar across treatments. Only high manure concentrations affected the colony founding success. Eggs from queens exposed to high manure concentrations took longer to hatch, which resulted in a delayed emergence of workers. Also, fewer pupae and workers were raised by those queens. Brake dust, soot and plastic particles did not visibly affect colony founding success, neither as single nor as multiple stressors. The application of manure, however, affected colony founding in negatively underlining the issue of excessive manure application to our environment. Even though anthropogenic soil pollutants seem to have little short-term effects on ant colony founding, studies will have to elucidate potential long-term effects as a colony grows.
昆虫是陆地生命不可或缺的一部分，提供诸如授粉和养分循环等重要的生态系统功能。由于近年来昆虫生物量、数量或物种丰富度大幅下降，人们的关注点已转向寻找其成因。人为污染是昆虫数量下降的主要驱动因素之一。尽管土壤污染风险明显，但关于污染物影响的研究主要集中在水生昆虫和传粉者上。土壤中积累的污染物可能构成重大威胁，因为其浓度往往很高，且多种污染物同时存在。在此，我们在蚁群建立阶段将黑花园蚁蚁后暴露于不同浓度和组合的污染物（刹车粉尘、烟尘、微塑料颗粒和纤维、粪便）中，以确定剂量依赖性影响以及应激源之间的相互作用。作为蚁群建立成功的指标，我们测量了蚁后的存活率、不同生命阶段的发育时间、幼虫重量和后代数量。在实验过程中，蚁后的死亡率非常低，且各处理组相似。只有高浓度粪便影响了蚁群建立的成功。暴露于高浓度粪便的蚁后所产的卵孵化时间更长，这导致工蚁出现延迟。此外，这些蚁后养育的蛹和工蚁数量更少。刹车粉尘、烟尘和塑料颗粒无论是单独还是作为多种应激源，都未对蚁群建立成功产生明显影响。然而，粪便的施用对蚁群建立产生了负面影响，凸显了向环境中过度施用粪便的问题。尽管人为土壤污染物似乎对蚁群建立短期内影响不大，但随着蚁群的生长，研究仍需阐明其潜在的长期影响。
