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Effects of plastic residues and microplastics on soil ecosystems: A global meta-analysis
Journal article   Peer reviewed

Effects of plastic residues and microplastics on soil ecosystems: A global meta-analysis

J. Zhang, S. Ren, W. Xu, C. Liang, J. Li, H. Zhang, Y. Li, X. Liu, D.L. Jones, D.R. Chadwick, …
Journal of Hazardous Materials, Vol.435, Art. 129065
2022
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Abstract

Plastic pollution is one of the global pressing environmental problems, threatening the health of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. However, the influence of plastic residues and microplastics (MPs) in soil ecosystems remains unclear. We conducted a global meta-analysis to quantify the effect of plastic residues and MPs on indicators of global soil ecosystem functioning (i.e. soil physicochemical properties, plant and soil animal health, abundance and diversity of soil microorganisms). Concentrations of plastic residues and MPs were 1–2700 kg ha−1 and 0.01–600,000 mg kg−1, respectively, based on 6223 observations. Results show that plastic residues and MPs can decrease soil wetting front vertical and horizontal movement, dissolved organic carbon, and total nitrogen content of soil by 14%, 10%, 9%, and 7%, respectively. Plant height and root biomass were decreased by 13% and 14% in the presence of plastic residues and MPs, while the body mass and reproduction rate of soil animals decreased by 5% and 11%, respectively. However, soil enzyme activity increased by 7%single bond441% in the presence of plastic residues and MPs. For soil microorganisms, plastic residues and MPs can change the abundance of several bacteria phyla and families, but the effects vary between different bacteria.

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UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

This output has contributed to the advancement of the following goals:

#6 Clean Water and Sanitation
#11 Sustainable Cities and Communities
#12 Responsible Consumption & Production
#14 Life Below Water

Source: InCites

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InCites Highlights

These are selected metrics from InCites Benchmarking & Analytics tool, related to this output

Highly Cited Paper 
Collaboration types
Domestic collaboration
International collaboration
Citation topics
3 Agriculture, Environment & Ecology
3.60 Herbicides, Pesticides & Ground Poisoning
3.60.2078 Microplastics
Web Of Science research areas
Engineering, Environmental
Environmental Sciences
ESI research areas
Engineering
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