AUTHOR=Mohsen Mohamed , Lin Chenggang , Hamouda Hamed I. , Al-Zayat Ahmed M. , Yang Hongsheng 

TITLE=Plastic-Associated Microbial Communities in Aquaculture Areas

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Marine Science

VOLUME=Volume 9 - 2022

YEAR=2022

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/marine-science/articles/10.3389/fmars.2022.895611

DOI=10.3389/fmars.2022.895611

ISSN=2296-7745

ABSTRACT=Microorganisms colonize plastics in the aquatic environment, but their composition on plastics used in aquaculture remains poorly studied. Microorganisms play a significant role in aquaculture in water quality and the health of cultivated species. In the current study, we explored the composition of microorganisms on floating plastics and their surrounding water collected from ponds and open aquaculture areas. Using scanning electron microscopy, the diversity of microbial communities, primarily diatoms and bacteria, was identified on the plastic surfaces. Also, epifluorescence microscopy revealed that procaryotes were colonized on all plastic samples from 0.1 to 29.27×103 cells/cm2, with high abundance were found in open aquaculture areas compared to ponds. Bacterial communities were characterized by 16S rRNA sequencing, which showed that bacterial communities on plastics were dominated by Proteobacteria, Cyanobacteria, Bacteroidetes, and Actinobacteria.  The level of these microbial communities on the plastics differed from those found in the surrounding seawater samples, and the abundance of potentially pathogenic bacteria was higher on plastics than on seawater samples. Moreover, hydrocarbon-degrading bacteria were higher on the investigated plastic samples than in water samples. This study contributes to the knowledge regarding the plastisphere community in aquaculture using high-throughput DNA sequencing.