Fish guts possess higher priority in assessing ecological risk of microplastics in both fish bodies and aquatic environments

作者：Zhe Wang, Sibao Chen, Yiwei He, Le Liang, Zhongguan Jiang · 发表于：Ecological Indicators · 年份：2024 · DOI：10.1016/j.ecolind.2024.112792 · 被引用次数：15 · 研究领域：Microplastics and Plastic Pollution、Recycling and Waste Management Techniques、Pharmaceutical and Antibiotic Environmental Impacts

• Fish guts can better reflect MPs pollutants both in fishes and aquatic environment. • The absence of food increased the ecological risk of fish in accumulating MPs. • Fish guts aggressively excrete MPs under severe microplastic contaminations. • Fish guts exhibited higher depuration rate with the presence of food resources. Microplastics (MPs, ＜5mm in size) have rapidly spread across aquatic ecosystems, which urgently needs systematic assessment for their ecological risk. Fish species have frequently been selected as indicator organisms in evaluating MPs contaminants. However, it has been questioned that which organs of fishes should be examined due to tissue-specific results. In this study, we investigated the accumulation and depuration process of MPs in the main organs of zebrafish under different MPs concentrations as well as the presence and absence of food resources. Our results recorded consistently higher MPs accumulation in fish guts among different MPs concentrations, implying fish guts as stable organs representing organisms’ MPs contaminants. Meanwhile, MPs accumulated in fish guts increased significantly with increasing exposure concentrations, highlighting fish guts as sensitive organs in reflecting MPs contamination in aquatic environments. In addition, MPs accumulated in fish guts under non-feeding conditions followed a logistic “S” curve while fluctuated under feeding conditions, suggesting increased ecological MPs risk with the absence of food resources. T...