Skip to main content

ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Environ. Sci.
Sec. Toxicology, Pollution and the Environment
Volume 12 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fenvs.2024.1452523
This article is part of the Research Topic Microbial Regulatory Mechanisms in Remediation of Industrial Wastewater and Contaminated Soils View all 5 articles

Distinct microbial community structures formed on the biofilms of PLA and PP, influenced by physicochemical factors of sediment and polymer types in a 60-day indoor study

Provisionally accepted
Yiying Jiao Yiying Jiao 1*Anqi Zhou Anqi Zhou 1Delang Zhang Delang Zhang 1Mo Chen Mo Chen 2Liang Wan Liang Wan 1
  • 1 Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China
  • 2 Hubei University, Wuhan, Hubei Province, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Microplastics (MPs) are colonized by biofilm-forming microbes. Biodegradable plastics, popular replacements for traditional plastics, still have unknown biofilm formation characteristics. We conducted a 60-day indoor experiment, where sediment was exposed to traditional MPs (polypropylene, PP), biodegradable MPs (polylactic acid, PLA), and glass beads (GLASS). The microbial communities in the MPs-biofilm were analyzed using high-throughput sequencing. Results indicated that Proteobacteria was the dominant phylum on all substrates, followed by Actinobacteria, and Firmicutes.At the genus level, the majority of microorganisms colonizing PP possessed nitrification and denitrification capabilities, while the dominant bacteria on PLA were capable of degrading lignin, cellulose and carbon metabolism. The genus Sphingomonas, a promising bacteria capable of degrading biodegradable microplastics, was particularly discovered on the PLA biofilm, meanwhile, bacterial colonization of PLA indirectly increased the potential for human transmission of pathogens.Redundancy analysis revealed that the pH and moisture significantly affected the bacterial communities. Pearson correlation heatmap indicated that the abundance of the majority of dominant bacterial genera of two MPs biofilms is negatively correlated with the physicochemical parameters of sediment (pH, moisture, TN, TP), except for salinity.The microbial communities associated with PP and PLA exhibited distinct differences caused by the combined effects of changes in physicochemical properties of sediment and different material substrates. This study provides further evidence of the significant selective features exhibited by microbial colonization on these two MPs when exposed to the same source community, offering insights into the exploration of promising bacteria for MPs degradation.

    Keywords: Microplastic, pp, PLA, sediment, Biofilm, bacterial community structure

    Received: 21 Jun 2024; Accepted: 23 Aug 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Jiao, Zhou, Zhang, Chen and Wan. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Yiying Jiao, Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.