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Straw incorporation lowers DGT-labile cadmium despite acidification in polyurethane microplastic-exposed soil
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In soil mixed with polyurethane microplastics, adding maize or wheat straw made the soil more acidic but still lowered the amount of easily available cadmium, measured using a diffusion based test. The change was linked to shifts in how cadmium attached to soil particles and to changes in carbon and nutrient levels, not to soil acidity alone.
Straw incorporation may acidify soil and has conventionally been expected to increase cadmium (Cd) mobility, but this response may change in microplastic-affected soils. This study used diffusive gradients in thin films (DGT), diethylenetriaminepentaacetic acid (DTPA) extraction, and sequential extraction to explore how straw treatment affects soil Cd behavior in the presence of polyurethane (PU) microplastics, while concurrently measuring soil physicochemical properties and plant Cd accumulation. Relative to the PU-only treatment, maize and wheat straw decreased soil pH from 6.5 to 6.0 and 5.9, respectively, yet reduced DGT-labile Cd by 22% and 27%. DTPA-extractable Cd and leaf Cd did not differ significantly from the PU-only treatment. DGT–DTPA divergence indicates that straw reduced the kinetically labile Cd pool and its solid-to-solution resupply rather than the bulk extractable pool. The decline in DGT-labile Cd coincided with a redistribution of Cd among operationally defined fractions, including increased Fe–Mn oxide-bound Cd under both straw treatments. The maize-straw treatment was associated primarily with lower soil organic matter, whereas the wheat-straw treatment decreased dissolved organic carbon by 32%, altered the composition of fluorescent DOM, and increased available potassium, with exploratory associations linking these C–nutrient changes to DGT-labile and root Cd. Together, these results show that, under the high PU exposure tested, dynamic Cd lability was governed by concurrent solid-phase partitioning and C–nutrient–DOM interactions rather than by soil pH alone. Our findings thus reveal a key limitation of pH-based prediction and support a process-informed framework that integrates dynamic Cd lability, carbon–nutrient interactions, and solid-phase Cd partitioning to assess Cd fate in microplastic-affected agroecosystems.
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