Abstract
In this study, we report the biodiversity and functional characteristics of microplastic-attached biofilms originating from two freshwater bacterial communities. Even though the microplastic-biofilm (MPB) diversities are mostly determined by original bacteria instead of microplastic types, the results from 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing still showed that the dynamic biofilm successions on different microplastics were highly dissimilar. Furthermore, the analysis of biomarkers indicated distinct bacterial species with significant dissimilarities between different MPBs, which further determined the associated functions. The co-occurrence networks showed distinct interconnective characteristics in different MPBs: The structure of MPB incubated in the lake water sample was more robust under environmental stresses, and bacteria in the tap water MPB interacted more cooperatively. Regarding this cooperative interaction, the analysis of functional prediction, in this study, also showed that more symbionts and parasites colonized on microplastics in the tap water than in the lake water. Moreover, it was suggested that MPBs were more easily formed in the tap water sample. The overall results revealed significant dissimilarities in bacterial diversity, succession, and associated functions between MPBs, in which bacterial species with specific functions should be taken seriously.
Highlights
Plastic is a common polymeric material worldwide owing to its excellent performance and relatively low cost, and it has already played indispensable roles in all walks of life
The overall operational taxonomic units (OTUs) number of lake water MPBs was much higher than that of tap water MPBs, regardless of PE and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) materials (Figures 1C,D). These results suggested that different microplastics serve as new vectors for different species sorting during biofilm growth and succession, resulting in diverse bacterial survival strategies of MPBs and varying degrees of Selective Bacterial Colonization by Microplastics B
The results presented above identified distinct bacterial diversities between MPBs originating from lake and tap water samples, suggesting an underlying discrepancy in the interactions within their complex bacterial communities
Summary
Plastic is a common polymeric material worldwide owing to its excellent performance (e.g., durability, anticorrosion, and plasticity) and relatively low cost, and it has already played indispensable roles in all walks of life. With an increasing demand for diverse types of plastic, its global production increased continuously from 1.7 to almost 360 million tons during the last 70 years (PlasticsEurope, 2019), leading to a large amount of plastic waste that has been disposed into the environment. Among these disposed plastics, plastic components of polyethylene (PE), polyethylene terephthalate (PET), and polypropylene (PP) are commonly produced and used, and they account for 90% of plastic production, along with polystyrene (PS) and polyvinyl chloride (PVC; Andrady and Neal, 2009; Alimi et al, 2018). Through long-term exposure and migration by water flow in aquatic environments, microplastics can be potential carbon sources that gradually release organic compounds into the water phase, contributing to the prolonged survival and growth of surrounding bacterial communities and the selective colonization of microplastic-attached biofilms that are distinct from other natural substrates (Tomboulian et al, 2004; Stern and Lagos, 2008; De Tender et al, 2015; Rummel et al, 2017)
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