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The evolution of bacterial pathogens in the Anthropocene
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Researchers reviewed how anthropogenic environmental changes — including plastic pollution — may accelerate bacterial pathogen evolution by altering mutation rates, horizontal gene transfer, and selection pressures, using the microplastic plastisphere as a case study for how pollution can drive microbial diversification with implications for human infection risk.
Humankind has become a primary driver of global environmental and climate change. The extent of planetary change is such that it has been proposed to classify the current geological age as the 'Anthropocene'. Anthropogenic environmental degradation presents numerous threats to human health and wellbeing, including an increased risk of infectious disease. This review focuses on how processes such as pollution, climate change and human-mediated dispersal could affect the evolution of bacterial pathogens. Effects of environmental change on the 'big five' of evolution: mutation rate, recombination (horizontal gene transfer), migration, selection and drift are discussed. Microplastic pollution is used as a case study to highlight the combined effects of some of these processes on the evolutionary diversification of human pathogens. Although the evidence is still incomplete, a picture is emerging that environmental pathogens could evolve at increased rates in the Anthropocene, with potential consequences for human infection.
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The aquatic plastisphere: ecology, pathogen dissemination and antimicrobial resistance
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Researchers reviewed the ecology of the aquatic plastisphere — the microbial biofilm community colonizing plastic debris — examining how its composition diverges from natural substrates, how it concentrates human pathogens and antimicrobial resistance genes, and how climate-driven changes in temperature, UV, and salinity may further reshape its microbial makeup and public health risks.
Environmental Emerging Contaminants Drive Bacterial Antimicrobial Resistance Evolution: Evidence, Mechanisms, and Challenges
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This review summarizes existing research on how pollutants like microplastics, along with other environmental chemicals, may promote bacterial resistance to antibiotics. It describes four possible mechanisms, including stress responses in bacteria, gene sharing between bacteria, and microplastics carrying resistance genes, and points to gaps needing further study.
Reshaping the antibiotic resistance genes in plastisphere upon deposition in sediment-water interface: Dynamic evolution and propagation mechanism
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Researchers examined how antibiotic resistance genes in the microplastic biofilm (plastisphere) evolve as MPs settle from water to sediment, finding that deposition in sediment reshapes ARG profiles and promotes horizontal gene transfer, amplifying resistance gene reservoirs in benthic environments.
Can plastic pollution drive the emergence and dissemination of novel zoonotic diseases?
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This review critically examines whether contaminated environmental plastics could facilitate the evolution and transmission of novel zoonotic pathogens, noting that microplastic biofilms frequently harbor pathogenic microorganisms. As human, animal, and plastic interactions become more frequent alongside rising plastic volumes, the authors call for urgent research into plastic waste as a potential driver of zoonotic disease emergence.
Plastisphere as a global hotspot for antimicrobial resistance: Systematic review and quantitative synthesis
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Bacteria growing on floating plastic waste swap antibiotic-resistance genes almost 7 times faster than usual, with PVC plastic being the worst offender. This review of 53 studies suggests plastic pollution may be helping create drug-resistant germs in the environment, though it's not yet proof this directly makes people sick, more research is needed.
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When a large batch of papers lands in the Atlas, we read through it and send a short write-up of what stood out.