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<p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:18.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>Newly-evolved
microbes may be breaking down ocean plastics<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'>By<span class=apple-converted-space> </span><span
class=author><span style='border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>Michael Le
Page<b><o:p></o:p></b></span></span></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'>25 May 2017<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'><a
href="https://www.newscientist.com/article/2132650-newly-evolved-microbes-may-be-breaking-down-ocean-plastics/?cmpid=NLC%7CNSNS%7C2017-0106-GLOBAL&utm_medium=NLC&utm_source=NSNS">https://www.newscientist..com/article/2132650-newly-evolved-microbes-may-be-breaking-down-ocean-plastics/?cmpid=NLC%7CNSNS%7C2017-0106-GLOBAL&utm_medium=NLC&utm_source=NSNS</a><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=author-byline style='margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white;
vertical-align:baseline'><span style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"lato","serif";
color:#333333'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:9.0pt;
margin-left:0in;background:white;vertical-align:baseline'><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>Plastic.
There should be hundreds of thousands of tonnes of the stuff floating around in
our oceans. But we are finding less than expected – perhaps because
living organisms are evolving the ability to break it down.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:9.0pt;
margin-left:0in;background:white;vertical-align:baseline'><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>Plastic
production is rising exponentially, so ever more of it should be ending up in
the oceans, says Ricard Sole, who studies complex systems at the Universitat
Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:9.0pt;
margin-left:0in;background:white;vertical-align:baseline'><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>But
surveys of areas where floating plastic accumulates, such as the North Atlantic
gyre, are not finding nearly as much plastic as expected.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<h2 style='mso-margin-top-alt:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:1.5pt;
margin-left:0in;line-height:19.8pt;background:white;vertical-align:baseline;
box-sizing: border-box'><span style='font-size:14.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#111111'>Mystery of the missing plastics<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<p style='margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white;vertical-align:
baseline'><span style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'>In fact, there’s<span class=apple-converted-space> </span><a
href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/fee.1297"><span style='color:#179CCE;
border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>only a tenth to a hundredth as much
plastic as expected</span></a><span class=apple-converted-space> </span>–
and the amount of floating plastic does not appear to be increasing. “The
trend should be there,” Sole says.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white;vertical-align:
baseline'><span style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:9.0pt;
margin-left:0in;background:white;vertical-align:baseline'><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>This
lack of trend cannot be explained by physical processes, according to his
team’s mathematical models. Instead, they propose that there has been a
population boom in microbes that have evolved the ability to biodegrade
plastic.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white;vertical-align:
baseline'><span style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'>Other researchers agree that surveys are finding far<span
class=apple-converted-space> </span><a
href="https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22530060-200-plastic-age-how-its-reshaping-rocks-oceans-and-life/"><span
style='color:#179CCE;border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>less plastic in
the oceans than expected</span></a>. However, they say there are several other
possible explanations for this <a
href="https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn26958-oceans-swallowed-13-million-tonnes-of-plastic-in-2010/"><span
style='color:#179CCE;border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>“missing
plastic”.</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white;vertical-align:
baseline'><span style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:9.0pt;
margin-left:0in;background:white;vertical-align:baseline'><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>Surprisingly,
even if ocean plastic is being degraded much faster than thought, it is not
clear that this is a good thing. “It is difficult to say,” says
Matthew Cole of Exeter University in the UK.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:9.0pt;
margin-left:0in;background:white;vertical-align:baseline'><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>For
instance, biodegradation could be speeding up the breakdown of large pieces of
plastic into lots of very tiny pieces, which might have a greater overall
impact.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:9.0pt;
margin-left:0in;background:white;vertical-align:baseline'><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>Plastic
also contains various additives that could get released and enter the food
chain if the plastic part biodegrades, says environmental chemist Alexandra ter
Halle of the Laboratoire des IMRCP in France.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:9.0pt;
margin-left:0in;background:white;vertical-align:baseline'><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>“To
really tackle the plastic problem, we need to stop it getting into the oceans
in the first place,” Cole says.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<h2 style='mso-margin-top-alt:7.5pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:1.5pt;
margin-left:0in;line-height:19.8pt;background:white;vertical-align:baseline;
box-sizing: border-box'><span style='font-size:14.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#111111'>The ‘platisphere’<o:p></o:p></span></h2>
<p style='margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white;vertical-align:
baseline'><span style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'>In theory it is possible that some microbes have evolved the
ability to break down plastics. Studies by Linda Amaral-Zettler of the
Netherlands Institute for Sea Research show that<span
class=apple-converted-space> </span><a
href="https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23794-plastisphere-microbes-go-to-sea-on-flotsam-fragments/"><span
style='color:#179CCE;border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>the microbes
colonising floating plastic are quite distinct</span></a><span
class=apple-converted-space> </span>from those in the surrounding water,
and suggest some are feeding on pollutants.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:9.0pt;
margin-left:0in;background:white;vertical-align:baseline'><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>In
effect, the plastic is creating a whole new ecosystem that Amaral-Zettler and
colleagues call “the plastisphere”.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white;vertical-align:
baseline'><span style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'>But when ter Halle looked at the DNA of the organisms on
floating plastic in the North Atlantic,<span class=apple-converted-space> </span><a
href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2017.05.059"><span style='color:#179CCE;
border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>she didn’t find any microbes
known to be capable of breaking down plastic</span></a>. That could be because
they have not yet been discovered of course – there<a
href="https://www.newscientist.com/blog/shortsharpscience/2008/06/counting-in-bacterial-world.html"><span
style='color:#179CCE;border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>could be
millions of unknown microbes still</span></a>.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:9.0pt;
margin-left:0in;background:white;vertical-align:baseline'><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>Amaral-Zettler
and ter Halle think it is more likely that floating plastic is simply sinking
to the seafloor as colonising organisms weigh it down, or breaking into such
microscopic pieces that it is not being caught in the nets of research vessels.
It could also be being swallowed by living organisms, or carried by currents to
unexpected parts of the ocean.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white;vertical-align:
baseline'><span style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'>The sinking explanation might also be compatible with his
findings, says Sole. His study does not prove that<span
class=apple-converted-space> </span><a
href="https://www.newscientist.com/article/2128659-plastic-munching-caterpillars-may-show-us-how-to-dissolve-waste/"><span
style='color:#179CCE;border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>microbes are
metabolising plastic</span></a>, but the lack of an upward trend can only be
explained by a biological response that can increase in proportion to the
amount of plastic. If a physical process was responsible, there would still be
an upward trend, he says.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white;vertical-align:
baseline'><span style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:9.0pt;
margin-left:0in;background:white;vertical-align:baseline'><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>It is
possible that some plastic is being biodegraded, Amaral-Zettler says, but it
could be over too long time-scale – a hundred years, say – to
explain the missing plastic. And even if it is happening much faster,
there’d still be a problem.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white;vertical-align:
baseline'><span style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'>Plastics are polluting every part of the ocean, from<span
class=apple-converted-space> </span><a
href="https://www.newscientist.com/article/2131051-remote-pacific-island-found-buried-under-tonnes-of-plastic-waste/"><span
style='color:#179CCE;border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>the beaches of
remote islands</span></a><span class=apple-converted-space> </span>to the
deepest parts of the sea. Large pieces of plastic can accumulate in the stomach
of animals such as turtles, which then starve to death.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white;vertical-align:
baseline'><span style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:9.0pt;
margin-left:0in;background:white;vertical-align:baseline'><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>While
there may be less than expected, large amounts of floating plastic are found in
the subtropical gyres where surface waters circle. While terms such as the
“Great Pacific Garbage Patch” conjure up visions of litter-covered
seas, much of the floating plastic in the ocean consists of tiny pieces just a
few millimetres wide or smaller, which are not obvious to the naked eye at all.
Its impact on marine life is not clear, either.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:9.0pt;
margin-left:0in;background:white;vertical-align:baseline'><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>Various
schemes have been proposed to remove this plastic from the oceans, but trying
to clean up the oceans is impractical, says Amaral-Zettler. “We need to
look at prevention and reduction at the start.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=references style='margin:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;background:white;
vertical-align:baseline'><b><span style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:#333333'>Journal reference:<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span></b><i><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333;
border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>Biorxiv</span></i><b><span
style='font-size:11.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333'>,<span
class=apple-converted-space> </span><a
href="http://www.biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/05/09/135582?%3Fcollection"><span
style='color:#179CCE;border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in;font-weight:normal'>DOI:
10.1101/135582</span></a><o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
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