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Recent advances in impacts of microplastics on nitrogen cycling in the environment: A review
Summary
This review examined how microplastics affect nitrogen cycling, a critical process in soil, water, and sediment ecosystems driven by microbial communities. Researchers found that the type, size, and concentration of microplastics can alter microbial populations responsible for nitrogen transformation, disrupting processes like nitrification and denitrification. The study highlights that chemical additives released from microplastics may also play a role, though the underlying mechanisms are not yet fully understood.
Nitrogen cycling plays a decisive role in biogeochemistry, and largely depends on microbial driven nitrogen transformation. The environmental problems caused by microplastics are becoming more serious, and the analysis and control of its pollution in the environment have become a research hotspot in the field. The nitrogen transformation and nitrogen cycling in the environment are mainly driven by microorganisms in the environment, and the existence of microplastics can affect the microbial population, abundance and type, thus affecting the transformation of nitrogen. The effect of microplastics on microorganisms involved in nitrogen transformation is briefly described. This paper mainly reviews the research progress on the impacts of microplastics on nitrogen transformation and nitrogen cycling in water, soil, sediment and sewage sludge. Microplastic type, size and concentration can cause obvious difference in the impacts of microplastics on nitrogen transformation. Then, response and mechanism of microplastics to microorganism mediated nitrogen transformation and nitrogen cycling are introduced. Processes of nitrogen transformation are affected by interfering with microorganism diversity and structure, enzyme activities and related coding genes and oxygen flux. Additionally, additives released from microplastics can also affect the microbial activity. However, mechanisms of microplastics on environmental nitrogen transformation and nitrogen cycling are not fully understood due to the lack of relevant research. There are effective strategies to evaluate complex environmental systems, prolong action time, strengthen multi factor and multi-level research, and assist molecular biology and stable isotope technology. This review article can provide valuable insights into the impact of microplastics on microorganisms mediated nitrogen transformation processes and evaluate the impact on ecological and environmental health.