Plastic pollution and the growing climate crisis are fundamentally linked not only in their underlining societal and economic nature of the problem but also in their co-occurrence in the environment. Indeed, they both pose a threat to habitats worldwide and endanger ecological engineers with cascading effects on the community these key species support. Here, we presented a short literature review on the effect of Micropalstics (MP) and their associated leachates – contaminants released by MP - and aerial heat stress on marine mussels, important ecosystem engineers in marine benthic systems. We underline the discrepancies in research effort (e.g. species, life stage, polymers used), and highlight the scientific knowledge gap on the combined effect of the two stressors, i.e. MP leachates and heat stress. We further assessed the impact of MP leachates on the ability of the mussel Mytilus edulis to survive heat stress. In addition, we asked whether differences in pollutants between virgin MP and those stranded on the beach may impact differently such ability. Mussel survival rates decreased when concurrently exposed to MP leachates and heat stress than when exposed to a single stress, particularly when in seawater with beached MP leachates. Our results stress the importance of a more integrated approach to determine the overall risk that ecological engineers may experience under increasing anthropogenic pressure.

Primary Presenter: Marine Uguen, Université de Lille (marine.uguen@hotmail.fr)

Authors:

Sylvie Gaudron,   ()

Katy Nicastro,   ()

Gerardo Zardi,   ()

Nicolas Spilmont,   ()

Solène Henry,   ()

Laurent Seuront,   ()