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Background
Plastics now pollute marine environments across the globe. On entering these environments, plastics are rapidly colonised by a diverse community of microorganisms termed the Plastisphere. Members of the Plastisphere have a myriad of diverse functions typically found in any biofilm but, additionally, a number of marine Plastisphere studies have claimed the presence of plastic-biodegrading organisms, although with little mechanistic verification. Here we obtained a microbial community from marine plastic debris and analysed the community succession across six weeks of incubation with different polyethylene terephthalate (PET) products as the sole carbon source, and further characterised the mechanisms involved in PET degradation by two bacterial isolates from the Plastisphere.
Results
We found that all communities differed significantly from the inoculum and were dominated by Gammaproteobacteria, i.e. Alteromonadaceae and Thalassospiraceae at early time points, Alcanivoraceae at later time points and Vibrionaceae throughout. The large number of encoded enzymes involved in PET degradation found in predicted metagenomes and the observation of polymer oxidation by FTIR analyses both suggested PET degradation was occurring. However, we were unable to detect intermediates of PET hydrolysis with metabolomic analyses, which may be attributed to their rapid depletion by the complex community. To further confirm the PET biodegrading potential within the Plastisphere of marine plastic debris, we used a combined proteogenomic and metabolomic approach to characterise amorphous PET degradation by two novel marine isolates, Thioclava sp. BHET1 and Bacillus sp. BHET2. The identification of PET hydrolytic intermediates by metabolomics confirmed that both isolates were able to degrade PET. High-throughput proteomics revealed that while Thioclava sp. BHET1 used the degradation pathway identified in terrestrial environment counterparts, these were absent in Bacillus sp. BHET2, indicating that either the enzymes used by this bacterium share little homology with those characterised previously, or that this bacterium uses a novel pathway for PET degradation.
Conclusions
Overall, the results of our multi-OMIC characterisation of PET degradation provide a significant step forwards in our understanding of marine plastic degradation by bacterial isolates and communities and evidences the biodegrading potential extant in the Plastisphere of marine plastic debris.
Keywords
Plastisphere, Polyethylene terephthalate, Plastic biodegradation, Microbial community succession, Proteogenomics, Metabolomics
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CURRENT STATUS: Published
View the published article at Microbiome.
Version 1
Posted 13 Nov, 2020
No community comments so far
Review #3 received
Received 03 Feb, 2021
Reviewer #3 agreed
On 02 Feb, 2021
Review #2 received
Received 26 Dec, 2020
Reviewer #2 agreed
On 24 Nov, 2020
Reviewer #1 agreed
On 22 Nov, 2020
Reviewers invited
Invitations sent on 17 Nov, 2020
Editor assigned
On 02 Nov, 2020
Submission checks complete
On 02 Nov, 2020
Editor invited
On 02 Nov, 2020
First submitted
On 27 Oct, 2020
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Subject Areas
General Microbiology
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A new preprint design is coming!
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See the published version of this preprint at Microbiome.
This is a preprint, a preliminary version of a manuscript that has not completed peer review at a journal. Research Square does not conduct peer review prior to posting preprints. The posting of a preprint on this server should not be interpreted as an endorsement of its validity or suitability for dissemination as established information or for guiding clinical practice.
Learn more about In Review
Research
Badges
Prescreen
This manuscript passed our Prescreen assessment
Complete author information
Appropriate declaration statements
Potential risks to human health
Prescreen
Peer Review Timeline
CURRENT STATUS: Published
View the published article at Microbiome.
Version 1
Posted 13 Nov, 2020
No community comments so far
Review #3 received
Received 03 Feb, 2021
Reviewer #3 agreed
On 02 Feb, 2021
Review #2 received
Received 26 Dec, 2020
Reviewer #2 agreed
On 24 Nov, 2020
Reviewer #1 agreed
On 22 Nov, 2020
Reviewers invited
Invitations sent on 17 Nov, 2020
Editor assigned
On 02 Nov, 2020
Submission checks complete
On 02 Nov, 2020
Editor invited
On 02 Nov, 2020
First submitted
On 27 Oct, 2020
Metrics
Comments: 0
PDF Downloads: ...
HTML Views: ...
Subject Areas
General Microbiology
License:
This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License. Read Full License
View the published article at Microbiome.
Background
Plastics now pollute marine environments across the globe. On entering these environments, plastics are rapidly colonised by a diverse community of microorganisms termed the Plastisphere. Members of the Plastisphere have a myriad of diverse functions typically found in any biofilm but, additionally, a number of marine Plastisphere studies have claimed the presence of plastic-biodegrading organisms, although with little mechanistic verification. Here we obtained a microbial community from marine plastic debris and analysed the community succession across six weeks of incubation with different polyethylene terephthalate (PET) products as the sole carbon source, and further characterised the mechanisms involved in PET degradation by two bacterial isolates from the Plastisphere.
Results
We found that all communities differed significantly from the inoculum and were dominated by Gammaproteobacteria, i.e. Alteromonadaceae and Thalassospiraceae at early time points, Alcanivoraceae at later time points and Vibrionaceae throughout. The large number of encoded enzymes involved in PET degradation found in predicted metagenomes and the observation of polymer oxidation by FTIR analyses both suggested PET degradation was occurring. However, we were unable to detect intermediates of PET hydrolysis with metabolomic analyses, which may be attributed to their rapid depletion by the complex community. To further confirm the PET biodegrading potential within the Plastisphere of marine plastic debris, we used a combined proteogenomic and metabolomic approach to characterise amorphous PET degradation by two novel marine isolates, Thioclava sp. BHET1 and Bacillus sp. BHET2. The identification of PET hydrolytic intermediates by metabolomics confirmed that both isolates were able to degrade PET. High-throughput proteomics revealed that while Thioclava sp. BHET1 used the degradation pathway identified in terrestrial environment counterparts, these were absent in Bacillus sp. BHET2, indicating that either the enzymes used by this bacterium share little homology with those characterised previously, or that this bacterium uses a novel pathway for PET degradation.
Conclusions
Overall, the results of our multi-OMIC characterisation of PET degradation provide a significant step forwards in our understanding of marine plastic degradation by bacterial isolates and communities and evidences the biodegrading potential extant in the Plastisphere of marine plastic debris.
Figure 1
Figure 2
Figure 3
Figure 4
Figure 5
This is a list of supplementary files associated with this preprint. Click to download.
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