An overview of microplastic and nanoplastic pollution in agroecosystems.
By E. Ng, E. Huerta Lwanga, S. Eldridge, P. Johnston, Hangwei Hu, Violette Geissen, Deli Chen. Science of the Total Environment, 2018
1,070 citations recorded by the source corpus.
Microplastics and nanoplastics are emerging pollutants of global importance. They are small enough to be ingested by a wide range of organisms and at nano-scale, they may cross some biological barriers. However, our understanding of their ecological impact on the terrestrial environment is limited. Plastic particle loading in agroecosystems could be high due to inputs of some recycled organic waste and plastic film mulching, so it is vital that we develop a greater understanding of any potentially harmful or adverse impacts of these pollutants to agroecosystems. In this article, we discuss the sources of plastic particles in agroecosystems, the mechanisms, constraints and dynamic behaviour of plastic during aging on land, and explore the responses of soil organisms and plants at different levels of biological organisation to plastic particles of micro and nano-scale. Based on limited evidence at this point and understanding that the lack of evidence of ecological impact from microplastic and nanoplastic in agroecosystems does not equate to the evidence of absence, we propose considerations for addressing the gaps in knowledge so that we can adequately safeguard world food supply.
Subfields: Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering, Pollution
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/916f397e652511d72e6d4daebbca8c4bc9976754
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In Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering
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Citations in the corpus
- A Global Perspective on Microplastics (2020, background): “Plastics at the soil surface are subjected to greater UV exposure, abrasion, and temperatures than water‐immersed materials (Ng et al., 2018).”
- Macro- and micro- plastics in soil-plant system: Effects of plastic mulch film residues on wheat (Triticum aestivum) growth. (2018, background): “Even though there is a growing concern about the microplastic pollution in terrestrial ecosystems, so far there has been no experimental research concerning both macroplastics and microplastics in the soil-plant system and the effects that this could have on plant growth (Cao et al., 2017; Ng et al.”
- Microplastic fiber and drought effects on plants and soil are only slightly modified by arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (2020, background): “Microplastic is becoming increasingly recognized as a factor of global change (Rillig, 2012; Machado et al., 2018a; Ng et al., 2018), owing to the fact that these materials are ubiquitously found in various environmental compartments * Corresponding author E-mail address:…”
- Interactions between microplastics and soil fauna: A critical review (2021, background): “MPs can enter terrestrial ecosystems via diverse pathways, such as applications of biosolids (Ng et al., 2018; Nizzetto et al., 2016), land use of sewage sludge (Corradini et al., 2019; X. Li et al., 2018), wastewater irrigation (Zhang & Liu, 2018), organic fertilization (Weithmann et al.,…”
- Microplastics accumulate on pores in seed capsule and delay germination and root growth of the terrestrial vascular plant Lepidium sativum. (2019, background): “Direct effects of plastic particles on terrestrial systems and vascular plants in particular are clearly understudied (Chae and An, 2018; Horton et al., 2017; Ng et al., 2018).”
- Potential Benefits and Risks for Soil Health Derived From the Use of Organic Amendments in Agriculture (2019, background): “Nevertheless, existing data on the impact of microplastics on the soil ecosystem are still very scarce [169].”