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Leaching of microplastics enhanced through complex soil meso- and macrofaunal community transport
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A mesocosm experiment showed that soil invertebrates — including earthworms and collembolans — actively transport microplastics deeper into the soil profile, significantly accelerating the downward movement of plastic particles beyond what occurs through water alone. This finding is important because it means microplastics can migrate more quickly into deeper soil layers and potentially into groundwater, expanding their environmental footprint well beyond the surface.
Microplastics (MPs) are emerging pollutants in soils that have a negative impact on the survival and reproduction of soil organisms. However, very little is known about soil fauna's role as transport agents of MPs into deeper soil layers. Here, we explored the effects of soil meso- (collembolans) and macrofauna (earthworms) on the distribution of linear low-density polyethylene MPs (LLDPE-MPs) down the soil profile in a mesocosm incubation experiment. Sixty PVC columns (10 cm in diameter x 23 cm in height), filled with agricultural soil, received 250 mg of LLDPE-MPs (300-600 μm) and soil organisms: earthworms belonging to three different ecological groups (epigeic, endogeic and anecic), and collembolans (a fixed mixture of epedaphic, hemiedaphic and euedaphic species), either as monocultures or in combination (all earthworm groupings, epigeic + Collembola, endogeic + Collembola, anecic + Collembola and all earthworm groupings + Collembola). Animal treatments without addition of LLDPE-MPs were also established as controls. Results showed that LLDPE-MPs were consistently leached in the control units after 14 days (66.75 LLDPE-MP particles leached in total), implying that infiltrating water alone can transport LLDPE-MPs down through the soil matrix. However, this downward movement of LLDPE-MPs into the leachate was significantly increased by ∼158 % (172.25 LLDPE-MP particles leached) when anecic earthworms were present and increased by ∼172 % (181.5 LLDPE-MP particles leached) when the mixture of the three earthworm ecological groupings were present. Leaching of LLDPE-MPs also increased when Collembola were combined with anecic worms and with the three-earthworm combination by ∼225 % (217 LLDPE-MP particles leached) and ∼276 % (250.75 LLDPE-MP particles leached), respectively (compared to controls). These findings suggest that most prominently anecic burrowing activity and the interactions between macro- and mesofauna enhance the vertical transport of MPs to deeper soil layers and leaching from soil at this limited experimental scale. We suggest that future studies on MP transport in soils include a more complex and representative population of soil organisms to account their collective influence on MP transport, so that predictive modelling for MP transport can faithfully factor in meso- and macrofauna variables.
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Leaching of Soil Microplastics Through Meso- and Macrofuanal Community Transport (manuscript introduction)
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Researchers investigated the role of soil mesofauna and macrofauna communities -- including earthworms from anecic, epigeic, and endogeic ecological niches -- in transporting microplastics (LLDPE, 300-600 micrometres) downward through soil columns in 18-week mesocosm incubations. The study was the first to examine how complex multi-species soil community structure affects microplastic vertical leaching, finding that faunal bioturbation significantly enhances microplastic transport beyond abiotic processes alone.
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Researchers exposed two species of soil springtails (collembolans) to surface-applied microplastics and found that these small invertebrates can transport plastic particles vertically into deeper soil layers as they move. This is one of the first demonstrations that soil fauna can redistribute microplastics downward in terrestrial ecosystems.
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