Microplastic debris in beaches of Tenerife (Canary Islands, Spain)

Álvarez-Hernández, Clara; Cairós, Carlos; López-Darias, Jessica; Mazzetti, Elisa; Hernández-Sánchez, Cintia; González‐Sálamo, Javier

doi:10.1016/j.marpolbul.2019.05.064

Cited by 83 publications

(31 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…LDPE, mainly used to make plastic carry bags and food packaging materials, is the most abundant petroleum-polymer on earth, and represents up to 64% of single-use plastics that are discarded within a short period after use, resulting in massive and rapid accumulation in the environment [1,2]. Despite recycling and energy recovery efforts, the harmful impacts of virtually "non-biodegradable" LDPE waste accumulation in landfill and in the oceans are increasing [3][4][5][6]. There is mounting evidence that micro-plastics are now found everywhere on the planet, including snow in the arctic [7].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Challenges with Verifying Microbial Degradation of Polyethylene

2020

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Polyethylene (PE) is the most abundant synthetic, petroleum-based plastic materials produced globally, and one of the most resistant to biodegradation, resulting in massive accumulation in the environment. Although the microbial degradation of polyethylene has been reported, complete biodegradation of polyethylene has not been achieved, and rapid degradation of polyethylene under ambient conditions in the environment is still not feasible. Experiments reported in the literature suffer from a number of limitations, and conclusive evidence for the complete biodegradation of polyethylene by microorganisms has been elusive. These limitations include the lack of a working definition for the biodegradation of polyethylene that can lead to testable hypotheses, a non-uniform description of experimental conditions used, and variations in the type(s) of polyethylene used, leading to a profound limitation in our understanding of the processes and mechanisms involved in the microbial degradation of polyethylene. The objective of this review is to outline the challenges in polyethylene degradation experiments and clarify the parameters required to achieve polyethylene biodegradation. This review emphasizes the necessity of developing a biochemically-based definition for the biodegradation of polyethylene (and other synthetic plastics) to simplify the comparison of results of experiments focused for the microbial degradation of polyethylene.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Challenges with Verifying Microbial Degradation of Polyethylene

2020

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“…Zhou et al, 2019;Chen et al, 2019;Corradini et al, 2019;L i ue ta l . , 2018;Piehl et al, 2018;S .Zhang et al, 2018S .Zhang et al, , 2020Liu, 2018,Y.Zhou et al, 2019), but also in soils of industrial areas (Fuller and Gautam, 2016), beaches (Álvarez-Hernández et al, 2019), vacant lands and woodlands in suburb areas of cities (Zhang and Liu, 2018) and flood plains close to populated areas (Scheurer and Bigalke, 2018). The result of these studies may suggest a ubiquitous presence of MPs in soil environments, regardless of the proximity or remoteness of human activity.…”

Section: Microplastic Occurrence In Soil Environmentsmentioning

confidence: 92%

“…i wi (wastewater irrigation), sw (sewage sludge application), in (industries), mu (mulching), at (aeolian transport), sc (sampling contamination), pwd (plastic waste degradation), co (compost application). (Álvarez-Hernández et al, 2019). MPs were also detected in remote areas such as high mountains in national reserves (Scheurer and Bigalke, 2018).…”

Section: Microplastic Occurrence In Soil Environmentsmentioning

confidence: 94%

“…Some similarities were found in MP morphological types and size composition. These results seem to be conditioned by the sources of MPs in the surrounding areas, hydrogeographic characteristics (e.g., topography, hydrography, and presence of ocean currents) and the limitations of the extraction and identification methods used (Álvarez-Hernández et al, 2019;B.Zhou et al, 2019;Piehl et al, 2018;Scheurer and Bigalke, 2018).…”

Section: Microplastic Occurrence In Soil Environmentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A methodological approach of the current literature on microplastic contamination in terrestrial environments: Current knowledge and baseline considerations

Dioses-Salinas

Pizarro-Ortega

De-la-Torre

2020

Science of The Total Environment

111

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Dirección estable: https://www.aacademica.org/gabriel.e.delatorre/2 Esta obra está bajo una licencia de Creative Commons. Para ver una copia de esta licencia, visite https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/deed.es. Acta Académica es un proyecto académico sin fines de lucro enmarcado en la iniciativa de acceso abierto. Acta Académica fue creado para facilitar a investigadores de todo el mundo el compartir su producción académica. Para crear un perfil gratuitamente o acceder a otros trabajos visite: https://www.aacademica.org.

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“…However, accumulation of petro-plastics wastes in the environment is now a major global problem because these materials are recalcitrant to natural biodegradation processes. As a result of their massive accumulation in municipal waste systems, micro-and nano-sized plastic particles are now ubiquitous in both terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems (Álvarez-Hernández et al, 2019;Bergmann et al, 2019). About 335 million tons of plastics were manufactured worldwide in 2016 (Plastics Europe, 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Microbial and Enzymatic Degradation of Synthetic Plastics

Montazer²,

et al. 2020

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Synthetic plastics are pivotal in our current lifestyle and therefore, its accumulation is a major concern for environment and human health. Petroleum-derived (petro-)polymers such as polyethylene (PE), polyethylene terephthalate (PET), polyurethane (PU), polystyrene (PS), polypropylene (PP), and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) are extremely recalcitrant to natural biodegradation pathways. Some microorganisms with the ability to degrade petro-polymers under in vitro conditions have been isolated and characterized. In some cases, the enzymes expressed by these microbes have been cloned and sequenced. The rate of polymer biodegradation depends on several factors including chemical structures, molecular weights, and degrees of crystallinity. Polymers are large molecules having both regular crystals (crystalline region) and irregular groups (amorphous region), where the latter provides polymers with flexibility. Highly crystalline polymers like polyethylene (95%), are rigid with a low capacity to resist impacts. PET-based plastics possess a high degree of crystallinity (30–50%), which is one of the principal reasons for their low rate of microbial degradation, which is projected to take more than 50 years for complete degraded in the natural environment, and hundreds of years if discarded into the oceans, due to their lower temperature and oxygen availability. The enzymatic degradation occurs in two stages: adsorption of enzymes on the polymer surface, followed by hydro-peroxidation/hydrolysis of the bonds. The sources of plastic-degrading enzymes can be found in microorganisms from various environments as well as digestive intestine of some invertebrates. Microbial and enzymatic degradation of waste petro-plastics is a promising strategy for depolymerization of waste petro-plastics into polymer monomers for recycling, or to covert waste plastics into higher value bioproducts, such as biodegradable polymers via mineralization. The objective of this review is to outline the advances made in the microbial degradation of synthetic plastics and, overview the enzymes involved in biodegradation.

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Microplastic debris in beaches of Tenerife (Canary Islands, Spain)

Cited by 83 publications

References 22 publications

Challenges with Verifying Microbial Degradation of Polyethylene

Challenges with Verifying Microbial Degradation of Polyethylene

A methodological approach of the current literature on microplastic contamination in terrestrial environments: Current knowledge and baseline considerations

Microbial and Enzymatic Degradation of Synthetic Plastics

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