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Exploring transfer of microplastics in the trophic chain: a prey-predator interaction case in the Strait of Messina
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Researchers examined the transfer of microplastics across trophic levels in a prey-predator marine food web, tracking particles from prey organisms to predators. The study confirmed trophic transfer of microplastics and found that predators can accumulate higher particle concentrations than their prey.
Over the last decades, microplastics (MPs) pollution has become a long-term global issue that seriously threatens the biodiversity and health of marine ecosystems. MPs can easily enter in the marine food webs indirectly through predation, undergoing transfer processes along the different trophic levels. In this regard, zooplanktonic organisms could play a key role in the MPs trophic transfer covering an important link between phytoplankton and higher trophic levels. Although many research have focused on accumulation and transport of MPs during experimental trials, only few of them have studied these mechanisms in natural environments food webs. In this study, a two-levels trophic chain - composed by a zooplankton species Thysanopoda aequalis (n= 58 samples) as prey and a mesopelagic fish species Argyropelecus hemigymnus (n=60 samples) as predator – was selected to investigate the MPs trophic transfer in the Strait of Messina food chains. An alkaline digestion protocol and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy were used to extract and characterize the MPs ingested by the two species. The preliminary results showed no differences in abundance and shape of MPs ingested among individual size for both species, whereas fibers dominated in the sorted. Blue, black and white were the predominant colors of MPs in T. aequalis, accounting for 63 Also see: https://micro2024.sciencesconf.org/559683/document
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Exploring transfer of microplastics in the trophic chain: a prey-predator interaction case in the Strait of Messina
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This study examined how microplastics transfer through marine food webs via predator-prey interactions, tracking the movement of particles across trophic levels. Results confirmed that microplastics can be transferred from prey to predator and accumulate at higher trophic levels, posing risks to top predators and fisheries.
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Researchers demonstrated that microplastics are ingested and transferred through a planktonic food web, with particles passing from primary producers to zooplankton grazers and on to predatory plankton, establishing trophic transfer as a real pathway for microplastic movement through marine food chains.
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