Assessing the Plastisphere from Floating Plastics in the Northwestern Mediterranean Sea, with Emphasis on Viruses.

ABSTRACT: Plastics in the ocean create the "plastisphere", a diverse habitat hosting various life forms. Other than the pollution induced by plastics, the co-occurrence of primary producers, symbiotic organisms, decomposers, and pathogens within the plastisphere raises questions about how they influence the dynamics of marine ecosystems. Here, we used a shotgun DNA-sequencing approach to describe the species thriving on floating plastics collected in two Mediterranean sites. Our findings revealed many species of bacteria, eukaryotes, viruses, and archaea on each plastic. Proteobacteria was dominant (70% of reads in the entire dataset), with other groups such as Ascomycota fungi (11%) and Bacteroidetes (9%) also being represented. The community structure was not affected by the polymeric composition

SUBMITTER: Lacerda AL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10972446 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature