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Impacts of Emerging Pollutants on Environmental Microbial Communities and Their Consequent Public Health Concerns

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Management and Mitigation of Emerging Pollutants

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Abstract

Emerging contaminants (ECs) are the mirror of society’s behavior and lifestyle. Despite the emerging knowledge about the presence of ECs in ecosystems, their impact has mainly been explored in animals (including humans). On the other hand, the impact of ECs on microbial communities has been disregarded to some extent. Most of the available works focused on the impact of ECs in microbial cells are directed to fluvial biofilms or wastewater microbial communities. Only a few works are focused on the effects of ECs in animal and plant microbiota and even in drinking water microbial communities. This work summarizes the possible impact of ECs in microbial communities in general, emphasizing the need to further investigate the risk of exposure of microbial communities to ECs, especially in drinking water, to predict or even prevent consequent problems for public health. Despite the variability of procedure and experimental design among the published works, it is known that specific ECs may alter microbial tolerance to antimicrobials and change microbial diversity and function in different ecosystems. However, the variations in experimental design among different studies hinder their comparison and consequently, the general conclusions about the impact of specific molecules. Moreover, the presence of mixtures of ECs with alterations in microbial behavior and biofilm characteristics cannot be disregarded. Therefore, the presence of ECs in water sources and ecosystems worldwide should be evaluated considering a “One-Health” perspective.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. LEPABE—Laboratory for Process Engineering, Environment, Biotechnology and Energy, Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal

    Inês B. Gomes, Ana R. Pereira & Manuel Simões

  2. ALiCE—Associate Laboratory in Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal

    Inês B. Gomes, Ana R. Pereira & Manuel Simões

Authors
  1. Inês B. Gomes
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  2. Ana R. Pereira
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  3. Manuel Simões
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Manuel Simões .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University Institute of Biotechnology, Chandigarh University, Mohali, India

    Nancy George

  2. University Institute of Biotechnology, Chandigarh University, Mohali, India

    Vagish Dwibedi

  3. School of Pharmaceuticals and Population Health Informatics, Faculty of Pharmacy, Dehradun Institute of Technology University, Dehradun, India

    Santosh Kumar Rath

  4. Faculty of Biotechnology and Food Engineering, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel

    Prakram Singh Chauhan

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Gomes, I.B., Pereira, A.R., Simões, M. (2023). Impacts of Emerging Pollutants on Environmental Microbial Communities and Their Consequent Public Health Concerns. In: George, N., Dwibedi, V., Rath, S.K., Chauhan, P.S. (eds) Management and Mitigation of Emerging Pollutants. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-41005-5_16

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