Biodegradation of polyethylene microplastics by the marine fungus Zalerion maritimum

Paço, Ana; Duarte, Armando C.; Costa, João Pinto da; Santos, Patrícia S.M.; Pereira, Rúben; Pereira, Manuela; Freitas, Ana C.; Duarte, Armando C.; Rocha-Santos, Teresa

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2017.02.017

Cited by 533 publications

(196 citation statements)

References 36 publications

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“…Nevertheless, it was intriguing to figure out whether the longchain PE (molecular weight > 2,000 Da) could be degraded by microorganisms from nature. A number of strains capable of degrading un-pretreated PE have been isolated from a variety of environments, including mulch films, marine water, soil contaminated by crude oil, sewage sludge, and landfills ( Table 2; Orr et al, 2004;Sivan et al, 2006;Sudhakar et al, 2008;Balasubramanian et al, 2010;Yoon et al, 2012;Tribedi and Sil, 2013;Harshvardhan and Jha, 2013;Yang et al, 2014;Azeko et al, 2015;Kowalczyk et al, 2016;Paço et al, 2017;Sarmah and Rout, 2018;Delacuvellerie et al, 2019). Some of these strains showed the ability to utilize un-pretreated PE as a carbon source based on the characterizations of biofilm formation on PE films, weight loss of PE materials, surface deterioration, and changes in the mechanical and thermal properties of PE ( Table 2).…”

Section: Pementioning

confidence: 99%

Microbial Degradation and Valorization of Plastic Wastes

2020

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Section: Pementioning

confidence: 99%

Microbial Degradation and Valorization of Plastic Wastes

2020

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“…In marine environments, fungi occupy a complex range of ecological niches but in plastic biofilms little is known about their functional role. Several fungal taxa from marine and terrestrial environments are able to degrade plastic polymers (Paço et al., 2017; Russell et al., 2011) and we know that although community composition is highly variable, fungi are early colonisers of plastics, meaning they are potentially important in biofilm formation (De Tender et al., 2017). Moreover, marine plastics are often covered in polysaccharide‐rich diatom biofilms (Lacerda et al., 2019), this could explain the attachment and association of fungi with biofilms on plastics (Kettner, Rojas‐Jimenez, Oberbeckmann, Labrenz, & Grossart, 2017; Oberbeckmann, Osborn, & Duhaime, 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Diverse groups of fungi are associated with plastics in the surface waters of the Western South Atlantic and the Antarctic Peninsula

et al. 2020

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Marine plastic pollution has a range of negative impacts for biota and the colonization of plastics in the marine environment by microorganisms may have significant ecological impacts. However, data on epiplastic organisms, particularly fungi, is still lacking for many ocean regions. To evaluate plastic associated fungi and their geographic distribution, we characterised plastics sampled from surface waters of the western South Atlantic (WSA) and Antarctic Peninsula (AP), using DNA metabarcoding of three molecular markers (ITS2, 18S rRNA V4 and V9 regions). Numerous taxa from eight fungal phyla and a total of 64 orders were detected, including groups that had not yet been described associated with plastics. There was a varied phylogenetic assemblage of predominantly known saprotrophic taxa within the Ascomycota and Basidiomycota. We found a range of marine cosmopolitan genera present on plastics in both locations, i.e., Aspergillus, Cladosporium, Wallemia and a number of taxa unique to each region, as well as a high variation of taxa such as Chytridiomycota and Aphelidomycota between locations. Within these basal fungal groups we identified a number of phylogenetically novel taxa. This is the first description of fungi from the Plastisphere within the Southern Hemisphere, and highlights the need to further investigate the potential impacts of plastic associated fungi on other organisms and marine ecosystems.

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“…For instance, over 200 microbes among bacteria, cyanobacteria, microalgae, and fungi in several different habitats, have been designated as able to indicate the presence and/or degrade oil hydrocarbons 62,63,64 . Additionally, other classes of compounds that cause impacts to the environment and to humans, such as plastic, bisphenol A, endocrine disruptors, and heavy metals, are targets for bioremediation technique development 65,66,67 . On the other hand, marine probiotic development has been limited to the fields that have an obvious impact on the economy, such as fish probiotics in aquaculture 68,69 .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Prospecting Microbial Strains for Bioremediation and Probiotics Development for Metaorganism Research and Preservation

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et al. 2019

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Pollution affects all biomes. Marine environments have been particularly impacted, especially coral reefs, one of the most sensitive ecosystems on Earth. Globally, 4.5 billion people are economically dependent on the sea, where most of their livelihood is provided by coral reefs. Corals are of great importance and therefore their extinction leads to catastrophic consequences. There are several possible solutions to remediate marine pollutants and local contamination, including bioremediation. Bioremediation is the capacity of organisms to degrade contaminants. The approach presents several advantages, such as sustainability, relatively low cost, and the fact that it can be applied in different ecosystems, causing minimal impacts to the environment. As an extra advantage, the manipulation of endogenous microbiomes, including putative beneficial microorganisms for corals (pBMCs), may have probiotic effects for marine animals. In this context, the use of the two approaches, bioremediation and pBMC inoculation combined, could be promising. This strategy would promote the degradation of specific pollutants that can be harmful to corals and other metaorganisms while also increasing host resistance and resilience to deal with pollution and other threats. This method focuses on the selection of pBMCs to degrade two contaminants: the synthetic estrogen 17a-ethinylestradiol (EE2) and crude oil. Both have been reported to negatively impact marine animals, including corals, and humans. The protocol describes how to isolate and test bacteria capable of degrading the specific contaminants, followed by a description of how to detect some putative beneficial characteristics of these associated microbes to their coral host. The methodologies described here are relatively cheap, easy to perform, and highly adaptable. Almost any kind of soluble target compound can be used instead of EE2 and oil. Video Link The video component of this article can be found at https://www.jove.com/video/60238/ 15. For instance, 4.5 billion people depend on ocean fish as their main food source 16 , which are greatly supported by coral reefs. Regardless of their ecological, social, and economic importance, coral reefs are being decimated 17,18. Anthropogenic activities are primarily responsible for contributing to the three main causes of corals' death: climate change, overfishing, and water pollution 19. Even though it is important to work on the mitigation of global warming, it is also important to work on minimizing local contamination, including water pollution,

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Biodegradation of polyethylene microplastics by the marine fungus Zalerion maritimum

Cited by 533 publications

References 36 publications

Microbial Degradation and Valorization of Plastic Wastes

Microbial Degradation and Valorization of Plastic Wastes

Diverse groups of fungi are associated with plastics in the surface waters of the Western South Atlantic and the Antarctic Peninsula

Prospecting Microbial Strains for Bioremediation and Probiotics Development for Metaorganism Research and Preservation

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