Ocean Plastics Host Surprising Microbial Array

MTorrice writes "A surprising suite of microbial species colonizes plastic waste floating in the ocean, according to a new study. The bacteria appeared to burrow pits into the plastic. One possible explanation is that bacteria eat into the polymers, weakening the pieces enough to cause them to break down more quickly and eventually sink to the sea floor. While the microbes could speed the plastic's decay, they might also cause their own ecological problems, the researchers say."

Comments

...cause their own ecological problems

[fustakrakich]

As does every living thing.

I always look at the bright side of these things. If we didn't have cars, we would be knee deep in horse crap.

Re:...cause their own ecological problems

[macraig]

If we didn't have cars, we would be knee deep in horse crap.

Being serious for a moment... no, we wouldn't. And that would be a good thing in spite of its effect on public health, insect control, and having to constantly clean it all up. There would only be localized agriculture, much lower crop yields, no processed and junk food, drastically lower human population, less opportunities for concentration of wealth... you get the picture I expect.

Re:...cause their own ecological problems

[Richy_T]

Yeah. When everyone is dirt poor and dying of a few dozen currently solved affliction, there will be much less opportunity for concentration of wealth. But you'll still be hating the dude who has shoes while you're coughing blood all over your bare feet.

Re:...cause their own ecological problems

[Enigma2175]

If we didn't have cars, we would be knee deep in horse crap.

Being serious for a moment... no, we wouldn't. And that would be a good thing in spite of its effect on public health, insect control, and having to constantly clean it all up. There would only be localized agriculture, much lower crop yields, no processed and junk food, drastically lower human population, less opportunities for concentration of wealth... you get the picture I expect.

You realize there were cities before there were cars, right? And in those cities, there was a LARGE manure problem? According to this page it was 3,000,000 pounds PER DAY in New York City. FTA:

"even when it had been removed from the streets the manure piled up faster than it could be disposed ofearly in the century farmers were happy to pay good money for the manure, by the end of the 1800s stable owners had to pay to have it carted off. As a result of this glutvacant lots in cities across America became piled high with manure; in New York these sometimes rose to forty and even sixty feet"

Yeah, sounds like a real utopia!

I bet they're pseudomonas putida

[afidel]

I bet they're either pseudomonas putida or a closely related pseudomonas, these are the bacteria that have been used to aid in the cleanup of oil spills and which naturally occur in the ocean bottom where petroleum oozes out of natural cracks in the cap containing them.

Re:I bet they're pseudomonas putida

[interkin3tic]

The only specific microbes mentioned in the abstract is the genus vibrio. The vast majority of microbes are uncharacterized, which is not surprising given the sheer number of branches in archea and eubacteria. Bacteria, for example, it's estimated that there are 10 million to a billion species. It would be surprising, to say the least, if there is only one microbe out there that eats petroleum or it's byproducts.

Re:I bet they're pseudomonas putida

[HornWumpus]

A billion species? Think how many of them must be endangered. Stop everything, think of the endangered microbes.

You there, reading /. How do you know there isn't a unique endangered microbe living on that acreage of ass you were about to scratch? Stop it, no washing ether.

Isn't this what we would expect.

[cfulton]

I'm always confounded when evolution does what it is predicted to do and we are all surprised by it. That waste can be used as food. Something will find a way to eat it. Evolution will fill available niches. That is the point to some extent of evolution. Why are we surprised that microbes are eating plastic? Why are we surprised that they then cause follow on effects? Seems obvious to me that it would happen given that it is in line with theory.

I would also comment that we need to find a different way of expressing changes in ecology. It seems that any change to the ecological status quo is regarded as a problem or disaster. We know from the historical record that nothing in nature stays in a steady state. We know that changes in ecology are often boom bust cycles that eventually find an equilibrium from which it will, over time, move away from into a new boom bust cycle. "Punctuated Equilibrium" - nice name for it.

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Given how late to the game plastics are, it is fairly impressive how fast they've moved. Some modified natural polymers go a fair way back; but most of the synthetics that we think of as 'plastics' are under a century old, are reasonably novel(not just a synthesis technique that is cheaper than the organic method for producing an existing material), and are often selected, at least in part, for good resistance to decay.

Also, polymers can be pretty tough molecules to crack: even something like cellulose, which is literally older than (some) dirt, is attacked primarily by a relatively small group of specialist organisms.

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[girlintraining]

I'm always confounded when evolution does what it is predicted to do and we are all surprised by it. That waste can be used as food. Something will find a way to eat it.

That's not strictly accurate. Neither is the supposition "and eventually sink to the sea floor." There are two growing patches of plastic which has been ground down to the point where it is now a gloppy film-like consistency to much of it, and it has been bleached white from UV light, and although it's almost degraded to the molecular level... it's not sinking.

Worse, it's killing everything in the area as animals try to turn it into food... which in turn thanks to the food chain, means other animals, who didn't eat it, become contaminated by it, and so on and so on. But at no point has there been much evidence of evolutionary adaptation to convert this plastic waste into an actual food product. Animals adapt to its presence... and maybe eventually won't die because it is infesting the environment... but anything much more complicated than an amoeba has shown zero ability to metabolize this.

You can't trust evolution to clean up after you. :/ This argument is as specious as suggesting that we shouldn't worry about global warming because eventually a creature will be born that eats all of our waste for us and shits out rainbows.

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[Tablizer]

But predicting the future path of evolution is like predicting the stock market. You can't plan around the schedule of mutations. Who knows if these plastic munching traits are a freak mutation caused by a single cosmic ray from Orion or something that has a predictable time-line.

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[Anonymous Coward]

Despite the hype, plastics are still very chemically similar to the organic compounds they are made from. There are a few lab-produced chemicals that are truly foreign to the biosphere, but plastics are much more familiar to the ecology than we were told each Earth Day.

The main argument for plastic alienation is that the dominant oil-eating organisms are deep ocean dwellers and all the testing was done in standard landfill conditions with the sorts of fungi and bacteria that thrive in anaerobic mud.

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[Anne_Nonymous]

>> 'plastics' are under a century old

Yes, but that's like a billion in microbe years.

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[interkin3tic]

The timescale is pretty short though. We're not talking about a natural food source that has been around forever, we're talking about something that has been around in mass quantities for, what, a century?

We know that changes in ecology are often boom bust cycles that eventually find an equilibrium from which it will, over time, move away from into a new boom bust cycle. "Punctuated Equilibrium" - nice name for it.

Punctuated Equalibrium, the theory, applies to evolution really, not ecology. And in one of his books at least, Gould points out it's really only talking about multicellular evolution. Bacteria don't do sex, they don't have "species" in the same sense that we do. "Species" often means something close to "organisms which can breed together." Asexual division obviously makes that not an issue. So bacteria aren't really constrained to punctated equalibrium.

He also pointed out in that same chapter that since bacteria dramatically outnumber eukarya, anytime some creationist starts yapping about how macroevolution is "unproven" despite microevolution, you could point out that microevolution is really the big picture that they've granted, and macroevolution is just a small, trivial detail.

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[omnichad]

Which means we really should be throwing our plastics in the ocean instead of a landfill? I guess recycling would suffice.

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[Anonymous Coward]

There are two growing patches of plastic [...] bleached white from UV light, and [...] not sinking.

On the bright side, those white patches are reflecting solar radiation and reducing global warming...

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[cfulton]

I was in no way condoning the degradation of the oceans with our waste. Neither was I arguing that we can trust evolution to clean up after us. I just get a little tired of the scientific media and even some evolutionary biologists who act surprised when things happen that are predicted by their science.

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[girlintraining]

I just get a little tired of the scientific media and even some evolutionary biologists who act surprised when things happen that are predicted by their science.

It's the difference between theory and observation, my dear. A scientist will always be excited when the two match. It's no different than the landing of the Mars rovers. Sure, we expected them to land... but we still broke out the champaign and celebrated when they did.

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[drinkypoo]

You can't trust evolution to clean up after you

Partly disagree. You can't trust evolution to clean up after you on a useful time scale. It will clean up after you eventually, even if incorporating plastic into a new paradigm (RIP Saint Carlin) is the means it uses to do this. You might not be around to see it happen, however, nor your hypothetical descendants.

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[drinkypoo]

Maybe use cages to form it into a giant floating island. Then sell it to Larry Ellison.

You'll also have to import a captive audience to get him interested.

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[TapeCutter]

This is no evolution. Evolution can't show its effects in such a short time span

So you're saying antibiotic resistant bacteria existed before antibiotics?

Re:Isn't this what we would expect.

[gmhowell]

Know what the difference is between Strychnine and LSD is, chemically? There isn't one. But the way the atoms are arranged will make the difference between a pleasant experience and a painful death.

Please stick to topics on which you have at least a passing familiarity. LSD is C20H25N3O. Strychnine is C21H22N2O2. Not even vaguely similar chemically.

Silver lining

[gmuslera]

If they can process plastics into something edible (work as CHON food sintetizers) or that can be metabolized by the ocean ecosystem could be a way to get rid of the Great Pacific garbage patch should be something pretty good.

In the other hand, if those start to pour into our plastic and oil dependant civilization could be pretty damaging.

Re:Silver lining

[cangrejoinmortal]

Excess nutrients are not always a good thing, those can cause an imbalance of flora and fauna because not all species can benefit equally or at all (and to some, are even toxic) from the new nutrients. This is exactly what happens in Xochimilco lake, south of Mexico City, where centuries of traditional agriculture and many endemic species were put in danger because of the excess nutrients that came from using the lake as a sewer which benefited a single species of algae to the detriment of almost all other species.

Frankenbug

[Tablizer]

What happens if this bacteria grows really good at it and starts munching away at everyday items on land?

You're at an interview or on a date and your polyester pants unexpectedly succumb to the hungry little buggers.

Re:Frankenbug

[srmalloy]

What happens if this bacteria grows really good at it and starts munching away at everyday items on land?

You get something like Mutant 59: The Plastic Eaters .

Re:Frankenbug

[afidel]

I was thinking The Andromeda Strain.

Re:Obligatory.

[Tablizer]

Here's to you, Mrs. Robinson!