The discovery that insect larvae can feed on kinds of foam plastics opened new avenues and provided a potential solution for plastic wastes biodegradation. This study aimed to investigate whether plastic polymerization types had regular impacts on larvae growth, gut microbial communities and functional microbes, foam plastics of polypropylene (PP), polyurethane (PU) and ethylene vinyl acetate (EVA) were selected as the representatives of different polymerized plastic and sole diets for yellow mealworms of larvae for 45 days, with sole bran diet as control. Our findings showed that although slightly weight gains were obtained in plastic-fed groups, the larval survival rates decreased to 61.33 %, 59.67 % and 24.00 % in PP-, PU- and EVA-fed groups, respectively. The EVA-fed group was even lower than the starvation group, indicating that the more complex polymers diet had worse adverse effects on larval survival. The gut bacterial- and fungal-microbiomes assessed by Illumina MiSeq indicated that both gut bacterial and fungal communities shifted upon diets of different polymerization types compared to the control. The gut dominant abundances of , and in PP-fed group were significantly different from that of unclassified Enterobacteriaceae in both PU- and EVA-fed groups. In contrast, all gut fungal communities in plastics-fed groups were similar with the dominants of and , but more abundances that had been reported with plastics degradation ability were obtained, such as and . In summary, . could efficiently degrade complex polymers, albeit with adverse effects. Core gut microbiomes were strongly associated with polymerization types of plastic diet, especially gut fungi.

中文翻译：

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黄粉虫幼虫对不同聚合类型泡沫塑料的摄入偏好和效率，与核心肠道细菌和真菌微生物组的变化相关


昆虫幼虫可以以各种泡沫塑料为食的发现开辟了新途径，并为塑料废物的生物降解提供了潜在的解决方案。本研究旨在探讨塑料聚合类型是否对幼虫生长、肠道微生物群落和功能微生物产生规律性影响，选取聚丙烯（PP）、聚氨酯（PU）和乙烯醋酸乙烯酯（EVA）泡沫塑料作为不同聚合类型的代表。黄粉虫幼虫用塑料和鳎粮喂养45天，以鳎麦麸饲料作为对照。我们的研究结果表明，虽然塑料喂养组的体重略有增加，但 PP、PU 和 EVA 喂养组的幼虫存活率分别下降至 61.33%、59.67% 和 24.00%。 EVA喂养组甚至低于饥饿组，表明更复杂的聚合物饮食对幼虫存活的不利影响更严重。 Illumina MiSeq 评估的肠道细菌和真菌微生物组表明，与对照组相比，肠道细菌和真菌群落在不同聚合类型的饮食下发生了变化。 PP 喂养组中 、 和 的肠道优势丰度与 PU 和 EVA 喂养组中未分类的肠杆菌科细菌显着不同。相比之下，塑料喂养组中的所有肠道真菌群落与 和 的优势相似，但获得了更多已报道的具有塑料降解能力的丰度，例如 和 。总之， 。可以有效降解复杂的聚合物，尽管会产生不利影响。核心肠道微生物组与塑料饮食的聚合类型密切相关，尤其是肠道真菌。