[ad_1]
There is little plastic that escapes, no matter what kind of creature you are, even a mosquito.
A study published in Biology Letters has revealed that mosquito larvae that grow in waters contaminated with microplastics carry plastics into their bodies and carry them with them to adulthood.
The results indicate a new way for microplastics to enter ecosystems, aggravating an already serious problem.
Plastic vectors
Microplastics, as their name implies, are small pieces of plastic of less than 5 millimeters in length. They are sometimes difficult to spot and are the result of large pieces of plastic that break down over and over again, or tiny pieces of polyethylene called microbeads. In any case, the accumulation of microplastics poses a threat to rivers and marine life, and their management is essential to cleaning our oceans.
The risk posed by microplastics is not just in the sea. Freshwater systems are also under threat and that's where mosquitoes come in.
Mosquitoes spend part of their life cycle in the water, first as eggs in a raft, then as larvae and pupae, before becoming adult mosquitoes capable of flying. As a result, they can take into account microplastic thinking about their food. The researchers decided to find out if these microplastics persisted in adulthood.
The researchers fed 150 microplastics of mosquito larvae of different colors and sizes. One group of mosquitoes received yellow-green fluorescent microplastics 2 microns long, while another group received fluorescent green dragon-colored microplastics 15 microns long. Microplastics were mixed with other legitimate sources of food in two cases, while a third group received a 1: 1 mixture of both types of plastics. One final group did not receive any microplastics.
Mosquito larvae consume microplastics assuming they are food. (Photo: James Gathany / CDC / Wikimedia Commons)
"Larvae are filtering organisms that direct small combs to their mouths, so they can not really distinguish a little plastic and some food," said Amanda Callaghan at the University of Reading and the one of the researchers in the study. Guardian. "They eat algae that are about the same size as these microplastics."
Of course, the group that received no microplastics showed no occurrence of microplastics for later analysis. But the other three groups all had varying levels of microplastics in the kidney equivalent of the mosquito in adulthood. The larvae eventually stopped eating microplastics at a certain age. The size of the microplastics made a difference in the amount retained by an adult, the 15 micrometer beads being more likely to be expelled over time than the 2 micrometer beads.
These results indicate that mosquitoes can carry plastic pollution. When they are eaten by predators such as birds or bats, not to mention other predatory insects, mosquito microplastics are transmitted to predators, thus preserving the plastic pollution of ecosystems such as rivers and lakes.
"This is a new way to get plastics up in the air and expose animals that are not normally exposed," Callaghan said. "We do not know what will be the impact."
Related to MNN:
How mosquitoes spread microplastics
One study found that microplastics can be kept inside aquatic creatures, such as mosquitoes, as they age.
[ad_2]
Source link
