Effects of Microplastics on Antibiotic Resistance Genes in Estuarine Sediments

Abstract

Microplastics and antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) are emerging pollutants/contaminants, and are also the research hotspots concerning environmental health in the past few years. To explore the effects of microplastics on ARGs in estuarine sediment, three different microplastics were added to microcosm incubation experiments of sediments. Then, we investigated the persistence, abundance, diversity, and shifts of the ARGs in estuarine sediments by high-throughput quantitative polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The results showed that the microplastics significantly changed the structure of ARGs in the sediments. PVC and PE, which are hard to degrade, had significant effects on the structures and types of ARGs. However, the PVA, which is soluble, reduced the types and persistence of ARGs significantly. The abundance of ARGs in S_PVC, S_PE, and S_PVA were 4.1×109, 8.1×109, and 2.0×109 copies·g-1, respectively. The abundance of ARGs in sediments with added PE almost increased by one order of magnitude, implying that microplastics could significantly increase the abundance of ARGs in sediments. Furthermore, OLS regression analysis showed that ARGs are significantly correlated with transposon and integron, suggesting that mobile genetic elements (MGEs) may promote the transfer and dissemination of ARGs.