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Distribution and changes in microplastics in Taihu Lake and cyanobacterial blooms formed by the aggregation of Microcystis colonies

  • Microplastic Pollutants in Terrestrial and Aquatic Environment
  • Published:
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Abstract

As a new type of pollutant, microplastics have attracted much attention. As the third largest freshwater lake in China, Taihu Lake is characterized by severe eutrophication caused by external pollution and frequent occurrence of cyanobacterial blooms. Although there have been previous investigations into the spatial distribution of microplastics in Taihu Lake, research on the relationships among microplastics, pollutants, and cyanobacterial blooms, as well as the spatiotemporal distribution and changing characteristics of microplastics, is deficient. This study investigated the characteristics of microplastics, pollutants, and cyanobacterial blooms in the surface water and sediments of Taihu Lake. The abundances of microplastics were 0–3.7 items/L in the surface water and 44.42–417.56 items/kg (dry weight) in the sediments. Microplastics are most abundant in the western, southern, and northern lake areas. The northern and western lake areas are severely polluted, and cyanobacterial blooms are prone to occur in these areas. This study found that microplastics exist in the surface water of the southeastern lake area, which is a source of drinking water, and the microplastics may thus have adverse effects on drinking water quality. As the main organisms in the cyanobacterial blooms, Microcystis and microplastics have similar spatial distributions in Taihu Lake and are both affected by wind. Based on a combination of the investigations of this paper with the existing research on the microplastics in Taihu Lake, the spatiotemporal distribution of microplastics was obtained: the abundance of microplastics in surface water has continuously decreased, there are no obvious spatial distribution differences, and the spatial distribution of microplastics in the sediments is the same as that in the surface water.

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Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are not openly available and are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

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Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (52108369), the Natural Science Foundation of the Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions of China (21KJB560017), the Special Project of Wuxi Water Resources Bureau (522001612), and the Special Projects of Central Universities (B200204028).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Environment, Hohai University, Nanjing, China

    Bin Wang, Wei Zhu, Lin Cheng, Xiaoge Xu & Yuehong Li

  2. Taihu Lake Research Center, Institute of Water Science and Technology, Hohai University, Nanjing, China

    Wei Zhu

  3. College of Civil and Transportation Engineering, Hohai University, Nanjing, China

    Wei Zhu, Hao Hou & Xiaowei Lin

  4. College of Architecture and Civil Engineering, Jiangsu University of Science and Technology, Zhenjiang, China

    Silin Wu

  5. Jiangsu Province Engineering Research Center of Geoenvironmental Disaster Prevention and Remediation, Zhenjiang, China

    Silin Wu

  6. College of Hydrology and Water Resources, Hohai University, Nanjing, China

    Zongpu Xue

Authors
  1. Bin Wang
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  2. Wei Zhu
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  3. Silin Wu
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  4. Hao Hou
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  5. Lin Cheng
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  6. Xiaoge Xu
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  7. Yuehong Li
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  8. Xiaowei Lin
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  9. Zongpu Xue
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Contributions

Bin Wang: Conceptualization, Methodology, Writing-Original Draft, Formal analysis, Writing-Review & Editing, Visualization; Wei Zhu: Conceptualization, Writing-Original Draft, Writing-Review & Editing, Formal analysis, Project administration; Silin Wu: Conceptualization, Writing-Original Draft; Formal analysis, Writing-Review & Editing, Conceptualization, Funding acquisition; Hao Hou: Methodology; Lin Cheng: Visualization; Xiaoge Xu: Methodology; Yuehong Li: Methodology; Xiaowei Lin: Methodology; Zongpu Xue: Data access.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Wei Zhu.

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Wang, B., Zhu, W., Wu, S. et al. Distribution and changes in microplastics in Taihu Lake and cyanobacterial blooms formed by the aggregation of Microcystis colonies. Environ Sci Pollut Res 30, 107331–107340 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-24959-6

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