TY - JOUR
T1 - Environmental exposure more than plastic composition shapes marine microplastic-associated bacterial communities in Pacific versus Caribbean field incubations
AU - Dudek, Kassandra L.
AU - Neuer, Susanne
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 Applied Microbiology International and John Wiley Sons & Ltd.
PY - 2023/12
Y1 - 2023/12
N2 - Microplastics have arisen as a global threat to marine ecosystems. In this study, we explored the role that plastic polymer type, incubation time and geographic location have on shaping the microbial community adhered to the microplastics, termed the plastisphere. We performed detailed bacterial plastisphere community analyses on microplastics of six different household plastic polymers, serving as proxies of secondary microplastics, incubated for 6 weeks in coastal Pacific waters. These bacterial communities were compared to the plastisphere communities grown on identical microplastic particles incubated in the coastal Caribbean Sea at Bocas del Toro, Panama. Ribosomal gene sequencing analyses revealed that bacterial community composition did not exhibit a significant preference for plastic type at either site but was instead driven by the incubation time and geographic location. We identified a ‘core plastisphere’ composed of 57 amplicon sequence variants common to all plastic types, incubation times and locations, with possible synergies between taxa. This study contributes to our understanding of the importance of geography in addition to exposure time, in the composition of the plastisphere.
AB - Microplastics have arisen as a global threat to marine ecosystems. In this study, we explored the role that plastic polymer type, incubation time and geographic location have on shaping the microbial community adhered to the microplastics, termed the plastisphere. We performed detailed bacterial plastisphere community analyses on microplastics of six different household plastic polymers, serving as proxies of secondary microplastics, incubated for 6 weeks in coastal Pacific waters. These bacterial communities were compared to the plastisphere communities grown on identical microplastic particles incubated in the coastal Caribbean Sea at Bocas del Toro, Panama. Ribosomal gene sequencing analyses revealed that bacterial community composition did not exhibit a significant preference for plastic type at either site but was instead driven by the incubation time and geographic location. We identified a ‘core plastisphere’ composed of 57 amplicon sequence variants common to all plastic types, incubation times and locations, with possible synergies between taxa. This study contributes to our understanding of the importance of geography in addition to exposure time, in the composition of the plastisphere.
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U2 - 10.1111/1462-2920.16519
DO - 10.1111/1462-2920.16519
M3 - Article
C2 - 37899673
AN - SCOPUS:85175371551
SN - 1462-2912
VL - 25
SP - 2807
EP - 2821
JO - Environmental microbiology
JF - Environmental microbiology
IS - 12
ER -