Effects of Pristine and Aged LDPE and PP Microplastic Leachates on Behavioural Responses of the Soil Arthropods Folsomia candida and Porcellionides pruinosus
Open accessAbstract
This study investigated the behavioural responses of the arthropods Folsomia candida (springtails) and Porcellionides pruinosus (woodlice) to leachates released from additive-free plastic polymers. Avoidance behaviour was evaluated to assess potential reductions in soil habitat function, while aggregation status was investigated to highlight possible functional impairments in the woodlice population. Leachates from pristine and artificially aged low-density polyethylene (LDPE) and polypropylene (PP) microplastics were tested at three different concentrations, ranging from environmentally relevant levels to a worst-case scenario of soil contamination. The distinct physicochemical structures of LDPE and PP led to different release compounds. The results revealed no statistically significant avoidance responses in arthropods for either treatment. Unlike PP, LDPE induced a statistically significant impairment of gregarious behaviour at the highest tested concentration (150 mg/kg d.w.). Furthermore, pristine LDPE induced more pronounced disaggregation than the aged one, suggesting that weathering may modulate behavioural responses depending on polymer type and endpoint. Therefore, it is recommended that high levels of plastic leachates can have an adverse effect on soil arthropods and that the aggregation behaviour of woodlice may be a more informative and sensitive biological endpoint than avoidance alone.
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
Cites
Plastic photodegradation under simulated marine conditions
Delre, A., Goudriaan, M., Morales, V. H., Vaksmaa, A., Ndhlovu, R. T., Baas, M., Keijzer, E., de Groot, T., Zeghal, E., Egger, M., et al. (2023) · Marine Pollution Bulletin · doi:10.1016/j.marpolbul.2022.114544 · Cited by 106 · cited 1× · see citing works
“Section S1: “Leachate characterization procedure” [19,71,72]; Table S1: list of the compounds detected in LDPE (pristine and aged) and PP (pristine and aged) leachates; Table S2: values of the proportion test (pc) for each treatment and concentration of the avoidance test in individuals of Folsomia…”
Liang, J., Chen, X., Duan, X., Gu, X., Zhao, X., Zha, S., & Chen, X. (2024) · Journal of Hazardous Materials · doi:10.1016/j.jhazmat.2024.133588 · Cited by 44 · cited 1× · see citing works
“…polyethylene films exposed at the soil surface generally exhibit stronger oxidation, increased O/C ratios, chain scission, embrittlement, and progressive loss of mechanical properties compared to buried materials, highlighting the dominant role of photo-oxidation under field conditions [15].”
Foetisch, A., Filella, M., Watts, B., Bragoni, M., & Bigalke, M. (2023) · Microplastics and Nanoplastics · doi:10.1186/s43591-023-00066-2 · Cited by 21 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
- Authors
- Masseroni, A., Federico, L., Becchi, A., Quinto, M., Saliu, F., & Villa, S.
- Affiliations
- University of Milano-Bicocca (IT)
- University of Foggia (IT)
- Corresponding author
- Villa, Sara
- ORCID
- Venue
- Toxics
- Publisher
- MDPI AG
- Published
- 2026-06-09
- Volume
- 14
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 502
- ISSN
- 2305-6304 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W7164150662
- Cited by
- 2
- References
- 3
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2
- FWCI
- 3.25
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Toxics (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- BOA (University of Milano-Bicocca) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Ministry of Universities and Research (20229KSJAT)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Pollution › Microplastics and Plastic Pollution
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Health, Toxicology and Mutagenesis › Environmental Toxicology and Ecotoxicology
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Pollution › Pharmaceutical and Antibiotic Environmental Impacts
- Keywords
- microplastic leachates, low-density polyethylene, polypropylene, plastic weathering, Folsomia candida, Porcellionides pruinosus, terrestrial isopods, avoidance behavior, aggregation behavior, soil arthropods, soil contamination
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
