Tossing those six-pack rings into the ocean after a day of fishing was never a good idea, but not just because of dangers to wildlife. Organisms and algae appear to be colonizing plastic trash floating in the ocean, which could lead to a perfect storm with consequences for marine life and public health, according to a recent study.
Researchers from Florida Atlantic University reeled in samples from eel larvae; plastic marine debris; Sargassum, a brown macroalga accumulating on beaches; and seawater from the Caribbean and Sargasso seas in the North Atlantic (Water Research 2023;120033:0043-1354). They sequenced the genomes of 16 Vibrio cultivars from the samples.
The Vibrio pathogens have the unique ability to latch onto microplastics and may be adapting to plastic.
“Our lab work showed that these Vibrio are extremely aggressive and can seek out and stick to plastic within minutes. We also found that there are attachment factors that microbes use to stick to plastics, and it is the same kind of mechanism that pathogens use,” said Tracy Mincer, PhD, an assistant professor of biology at FAU’s Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute and Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College, in Jupiter, Fla.
Vertebrate pathogens related to cholera and non-cholera bacterial strains were also found. In addition, rapid biofilm formation, hemolytic and lipophospholytic activities, consistent with pathogenic potential were confirmed. Associated microbial flora may house potent opportunistic pathogens due to increases in interactions among people, Sargassum and plastics. The ecological relationship between Vibrio and Sargassum is largely unknown, and there is insufficient evidence about whether plastic trash colonized by these organisms could pose an infectious threat.
Sargassum are being investigated for use as fertilizers and animal feeds (Front Mar Sci 2022;8. https://doi.org/10.3389/ fmars.2021.791054).
This article is from the June 2023 print issue.