Saturday, March 20, 2021

Illinois youth opioid use linked with other substance misuse, mental health issues

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURAL, CONSUMER AND ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES

IMAGE: UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS RESEARCHERS ALLEN BARTON (LEFT) AND DOUG SMITH FOUND OPIOID USE AMONG ILLINOIS HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS TIED TO OTHER SUBSTANCE USE AND MENTAL HEALTH CONCERNS. view more
CREDIT: PHOTO: L. BRIAN STAUFFER, UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS.

URBANA, Ill. - Opioid use has dramatically increased in the 21st century, especially among young adults. A new study from the University of Illinois provides insights on usage patterns among Illinois high school students to help inform prevention and treatment strategies.

"The societal and personal costs of opioid misuse are massive. There's been a lot of focus on trying to understand how to combat the current epidemic. But we also need to make sure we have good data in order to know how we should apply our efforts," says Allen Barton, assistant professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies at U of I and lead author on the study.

The researchers based their study on information from the 2018 Illinois Youth Survey (IYS), which measures risk behaviors among high school students.

Over 230,000 students across Illinois typically participate in the biannual survey, says Doug Smith, professor of social work and director of the Center for Prevention Research and Development at U of I. Smith is co-author on the opioid study and principal investigator for the IYS.

The study focused on 18-to 19-year-olds, the beginning of a developmental stage when opioid use vulnerability is highest, Barton says.

Among the more than 26,000 respondents in this age group, 5.6% (1,468 youth) indicated they had used prescription pain medication in the past year without a prescription or differently than intended; that is, non-medical use of prescription opioids.

"Another 2.6% (682 youth) reported they had used prescription painkillers to get high. This addresses motive of use, which is an important part of understanding the issue," Barton says.

Finally, 0.4% of the sample (105 youth) reported they had used heroin in the past year. Heroin is another form of opioid that is not in the form of prescription medication, Barton notes.

The researchers found clear differences in characteristics of opioid users versus non-users.

"The individuals engaging in opioid use are also engaging in heightened levels of other forms of substance misuse, primarily alcohol and cannabis. They have more mental health concerns and higher suicide intent. And those who are using opioids report much lower grades and much higher levels of being victims of bullying," Barton says.

As opioid use is closely linked with other forms of substance misuse, counselors and medical practitioners should treat it as part of a pattern, Smith states. "This contradicts the typical image of a non-substance-using youth who one day decides to use opioids and then gets progressively addicted. That doesn't typically happen. These kids are already using other substances, often at levels indicative of problematic use. It seems more like a progression of general substance use than specific opioid usage," he notes.

The researchers also analyzed the data to look for profiles among the subset of youth using opioids.

"Our findings indicated three main profiles of individuals reporting opioid use. You have one group, comprising slightly more than half of this subsample, that's using opioids, but not specifically to get high. You have another group of individuals reporting a clear motive of use to get high. And a third, small group that's just using heroin," Barton notes.

While there were many similarities among the three groups, individuals who reported using opioids to get high also reported much more problematic substance abuse overall, as well as higher suicide risk compared to people who are engaged in non-medical use of prescription opioids without such motive, Smith adds.

The researchers say their study shows opioid use is a complex issue which needs tailored approaches to treatment and prevention.

"In order to address opioid use at this developmental stage, which is a transition to adulthood, we need to realize it is indicative of a broader pattern of factors related to other substance use and mental health issues that require attention. A one-step approach to just address the opioid use may not be sufficient," Barton states.

"The good news in this data is that opioid use rates are very low for this demographic across the state. However, for a subset of youth who do use, it appears to be making a difficult situation all the more challenging."

Barton and Smith say the correlation with other forms of substance misuse can help identify opioid use at an early stage.

"For any youth who is getting treatment for another substance, we need to be screening for whether they're using opioids, and we need to have a prevention program within a treatment program," Smith says.

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The IYS is administered every other year to schools across Illinois. Survey reports are available at the Illinois Youth Survey website. Schools can also register online for participation.

The Department of Human Development and Family Studies is in the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences, University of Illinois.

The paper, "Opioid use at the transition to emerging adulthood: A latent class analysis of non-medical use of prescription opioids and heroin use," is published in Addictive Behaviors. [DOI: 10.1016/j.addbeh.2020.106757]

Authors include Allen Barton, Crystal Reinhart, Corey Campbell, and Doug Smith.

Support for the development of this article was provided by the Illinois Department of Human Services (#43CZZ03292; PI: Smith). The views expressed by the authors are their own, however, and do not reflect official positions of the State of Illinois.

Study shows stronger brain activity after writing on paper than on tablet or smartphone

Unique, complex information in analog methods likely gives brain more details to trigger memory

UNIVERSITY OF TOKYO

Research News

A study of Japanese university students and recent graduates has revealed that writing on physical paper can lead to more brain activity when remembering the information an hour later. Researchers say that the unique, complex, spatial and tactile information associated with writing by hand on physical paper is likely what leads to improved memory.

"Actually, paper is more advanced and useful compared to electronic documents because paper contains more one-of-a-kind information for stronger memory recall," said Professor Kuniyoshi L. Sakai, a neuroscientist at the University of Tokyo and corresponding author of the research recently published in Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience. The research was completed with collaborators from the NTT Data Institute of Management Consulting.

Contrary to the popular belief that digital tools increase efficiency, volunteers who used paper completed the note-taking task about 25% faster than those who used digital tablets or smartphones.

Although volunteers wrote by hand both with pen and paper or stylus and digital tablet, researchers say paper notebooks contain more complex spatial information than digital paper. Physical paper allows for tangible permanence, irregular strokes, and uneven shape, like folded corners. In contrast, digital paper is uniform, has no fixed position when scrolling, and disappears when you close the app.

"Our take-home message is to use paper notebooks for information we need to learn or memorize," said Sakai.

In the study, a total of 48 volunteers read a fictional conversation between characters discussing their plans for two months in the near future, including 14 different class times, assignment due dates and personal appointments. Researchers performed pre-test analyses to ensure that the volunteers, all 18-29 years old and recruited from university campuses or NTT offices, were equally sorted into three groups based on memory skills, personal preference for digital or analog methods, gender, age and other aspects.

Volunteers then recorded the fictional schedule using a paper datebook and pen, a calendar app on a digital tablet and a stylus, or a calendar app on a large smartphone and a touch-screen keyboard. There was no time limit and volunteers were asked to record the fictional events in the same way as they would for their real-life schedules, without spending extra time to memorize the schedule.

After one hour, including a break and an interference task to distract them from thinking about the calendar, volunteers answered a range of simple (When is the assignment due?) and complex (Which is the earlier due date for the assignments?) multiple choice questions to test their memory of the schedule. While they completed the test, volunteers were inside a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanner, which measures blood flow around the brain. This is a technique called functional MRI (fMRI), and increased blood flow observed in a specific region of the brain is a sign of increased neuronal activity in that area.

Participants who used a paper datebook filled in the calendar within about 11 minutes. Tablet users took 14 minutes and smartphone users took about 16 minutes. Volunteers who used analog methods in their personal life were just as slow at using the devices as volunteers who regularly use digital tools, so researchers are confident that the difference in speed was related to memorization or associated encoding in the brain, not just differences in the habitual use of the tools.

Volunteers who used analog methods scored better than other volunteers only on simple test questions. However, researchers say that the brain activation data revealed significant differences.

Volunteers who used paper had more brain activity in areas associated with language, imaginary visualization, and in the hippocampus -- an area known to be important for memory and navigation. Researchers say that the activation of the hippocampus indicates that analog methods contain richer spatial details that can be recalled and navigated in the mind's eye.

"Digital tools have uniform scrolling up and down and standardized arrangement of text and picture size, like on a webpage. But if you remember a physical textbook printed on paper, you can close your eyes and visualize the photo one-third of the way down on the left-side page, as well as the notes you added in the bottom margin," Sakai explained.

Researchers say that personalizing digital documents by highlighting, underlining, circling, drawing arrows, handwriting color-coded notes in the margins, adding virtual sticky notes, or other types of unique mark-ups can mimic analog-style spatial enrichment that may enhance memory.

Although they have no data from younger volunteers, researchers suspect that the difference in brain activation between analog and digital methods is likely to be stronger in younger people.

"High school students' brains are still developing and are so much more sensitive than adult brains," said Sakai.

Although the current research focused on learning and memorization, the researchers encourage using paper for creative pursuits as well.

"It is reasonable that one's creativity will likely become more fruitful if prior knowledge is stored with stronger learning and more precisely retrieved from memory. For art, composing music, or other creative works, I would emphasize the use of paper instead of digital methods," said Sakai.

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This research is a peer-reviewed, experimental study on people published in Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience. Funding was provided by the Consortium for Applied Neuroscience at NTT Data Institute of Management Consulting, Inc. The funder was not involved in the study design, collection, analysis, interpretation of data, the writing of the research paper, or the decision to submit it for publication.

Research Publication

Keita Umejima, Takuya Ibaraki, Takahiro Yamazaki, and Kuniyoshi L. Sakai. 19 March 2021. Paper Notebooks vs. Mobile Devices: Brain Activation Differences During Memory Retrieval. Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience. DOI: 10.3389/fnbeh.2021.634158

Real "doodles of light" in real-time mark leap for holograms at home

Fast line-based algorithm turns hand-writing into holograms using standard CPUs

TOKYO METROPOLITAN UNIVERSITY

Research News

Volume 90%

VIDEO: HANDWRITING ON A TABLET IS CONVERTED INTO 3D IMAGES IN REAL-TIME USING A STANDARD DESKTOP PC. view more

CREDIT: TOKYO METROPOLITAN UNIVERSITY

Tokyo, Japan - Researchers from Tokyo Metropolitan University have devised and implemented a simplified algorithm for turning freely drawn lines into holograms on a standard desktop CPU. They dramatically cut down the computational cost and power consumption of algorithms that require dedicated hardware. It is fast enough to convert writing into lines in real-time, and makes crisp, clear images that meet industry standards. Potential applications include hand-written remote instructions superimposed on landscapes and workbenches.

Flying cars, robots, spaceships...whatever sci-fi future you can imagine, there is always a common feature: holograms. But holography isn't just about aesthetics. Its potential applications include important enhancements to vital, practical tasks, like remote instructions for surgical procedures, electronic assembly on circuit boards, or directions projected on landscapes for navigation. Making holograms available in a wide range of settings is vital to bringing this technology out of the lab and into our daily lives.

One of the major drawbacks of this state-of-the-art technology is the computational load of hologram generation. The kind of quality we've come to expect in our 2D displays is prohibitive in 3D, requiring supercomputing levels of number crunching to achieve. There is also the issue of power consumption. More widely available hardware like GPUs in gaming rigs might be able to overcome some of these issues with raw power, but the amount of electricity they use is a major impediment to mobile applications. Despite improvements to available hardware, the solution is not something we can expect from brute-force.

A key solution is to limit the kind of images that are projected. Now, a team led by Assistant Professor Takashi Nishitsuji have proposed and implemented a solution with unprecedented performance. They specifically chose to exclusively draw lines in 3D space. Though this may sound drastic at first, the number of things you can do is still impressive. In a particularly elegant implementation, they connected a tablet to a PC and conventional hologram generation hardware i.e. a laser and a spatial light modulator. Their algorithm is fast enough that handwriting on the tablet could be converted to images in the air in real-time. The PC they used was a standard desktop with no GPU, significantly expanding where it might be implemented. Though the images were slightly inferior in quality to other, more computationally intensive methods, the sharpness of the writing comfortably met industry standards.

All this means that holograms might soon be arriving in our homes or workplaces. The team is especially focused on implementations in heads-up displays (HUDs) in helmets and cars, where navigation instructions might be displayed on the landscape instead of voice instructions or distracting screens. The light computational load of the algorithm significantly expands the horizons for this promising technology; that sci-fi "future" might not be the future for much longer.

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This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research (20K19810, 19H01097), the Inoue Foundation for Science, the Takayanagi Kenjiro Foundation and Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek (12ZQ220N, VS07820N).

Christmas Island reptile-killer identified

Bacterium responsible for deaths of critically endangered species

UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY

Research News

IMAGE: ONE OF THE AUSTRALIAN-NATIVE, CRITICALLY ENDANGERED LIZARD SPECIES: LISTER'S GECKO. view more
CREDIT: PARKS AUSTRALIA.

Native reptile populations on Christmas Island have been in severe decline with two species, Lister's gecko and the blue-tailed skink, entirely disappearing from the wild. While previously the main driver for this decline is likely predation by invasive species and habitat destruction, a silent killer is now threatening to wipe the species out entirely.

Those bred in captivity on the Australian Territory in the Indian Ocean have also been mysteriously dying, leaving the two species - which number only around 1000 each - in danger of extinction. Veterinary scientists from the University of Sydney, the Australian Registry of Wildlife Health and the Taronga Conservation Society Australia have now discovered the cause of these deaths: a bacterium, Enterococcus lacertideformus (E. lacertideformus).

The bacterium was discovered in 2014 after captive reptiles presented with facial deformities and lethargy, and some even died. Samples were collected and analysed using microscopy and genetic testing.

The researchers' findings, published in Frontiers in Microbiology, will inform antibiotic trials on the reptiles to see if the infection can be treated.

The bacterium grows in the animal's head, then in its internal organs, before eventually causing death. It can be spread by direct contact - including through reptiles' mouths, or via reptiles biting one another - often during breeding season fights.

"This means that healthy captive animals need to be kept apart from infected ones and should also be kept away from areas where infected animals have been," said Jessica Agius, co-lead researcher and PhD candidate in the Sydney School of Veterinary Science.

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Infected gecko displaying severe head and facial swelling associated with Enterococcus lacertideformus infection.

CREDIT

Jessica Agius.

Ms Agius and the research team not only identified the bacterium, they decoded its genetic structure using whole genome sequencing.

Specific genes were identified that are likely to be associated with the bacterium's ability to infect its host, invade its tissues and avoid the immune system.

"We also found that the bacterium can surround itself with a biofilm - a 'community of bacteria' that can help it survive," Ms Agius said.

"Understanding how E. lacertideformus produces and maintains the biofilm may provide insights on how to treat other species of biofilm-forming bacteria."

The search of the genetic code suggested that the killer bacterium was susceptible to most antibiotics.

Professor David Phalen, research co-lead and Ms Agius' PhD supervisor, said: "This suggests that infected animals might be successfully treated. That's what we need to determine now."

In another effort to protect the endangered reptiles on Christmas Island, a population of blue-tailed skinks has been established on the Cocos Islands. Ms Agius played a critical role in the translocation, testing reptiles on the Cocos Islands to make sure that they were free of E. lacertideformus.

"It's critical we act now to ensure these native reptiles survive," Ms Agius said.

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PhD researcher Jessica Agius spotlighting critically endangered lizards in the field on Christmas Island to find out if they are infected with Enterococcus lacertideformus.

An easy way to reduce socioeconomic disparities

News from the Journal of Marketing

AMERICAN MARKETING ASSOCIATION

NEWS RELEASE 20-MAR-2021

Research News

Researchers from Columbia University and Temple University published a new paper in the Journal of Marketing that examines how choice architecture can reduce socioeconomic disparities.

The study, forthcoming in the Journal of Marketing, is titled "Do Nudges Reduce Disparities? Choice Architecture Compensates for Low Consumer Knowledge" and is authored by Kellen Mrkva, Nathaniel Posner, Crystal Reeck, and Eric Johnson.

As Mrkva explains, "Our research demonstrates that people with low socioeconomic status (SES), low numerical ability, and low knowledge are most impacted by nudges. As a result, 'good nudges,' designed to encourage selection of options that are in people's best interests, reduce SES disparities, helping low-SES people more than high-SES people." On the other hand, nudges that encourage selection of inferior options exacerbate disparities relative to "good nudges" because low-SES consumers are more likely to retain inferior default options. In other words, nudges are a double-edged sword that can either reduce disparities or make matters worse because they impact low-SES people most. The research team generalized its findings across three different types of nudges, several different consumer decision contexts, and real retirement decisions.

This research has major implications, including for the COVID vaccination process. Across the country, millions of people are now eligible to get a COVID vaccine. However, the signup process is often unnecessarily complex. New York's nycHealthy sign-up portal, for example, includes as many as 51 questions and requests that you upload your insurance card. As a result, many people, especially the elderly, poor, and less digitally literate, have struggled or failed to make an appointment. As Johnson explains, "Our research suggests that making beneficial behaviors like vaccination simpler has a crucial and underappreciated advantage--it reduces socioeconomic disparities. On the other hand, when these behaviors are unnecessarily complex, it is typically low-SES consumers who are harmed the most."

In five experiments as well as data from real retirement decisions, the researchers show that people who are lower in SES, domain knowledge, and numeracy are impacted more by a variety of nudges. As a result, "good nudges" that facilitate selection of welfare-enhancing options reduce disparities by helping low-SES, low-knowledge, and low-numeracy consumers most.

In Study 1, participants made five consumer financial decisions. For each decision, they were randomly assigned to a "no default," "good default," or "bad default" condition (the latter two pre-selected correct or incorrect options, respectively). After they made these five decisions, participants completed common measures of the three hypothesized moderators--financial literacy, numeracy, and socioeconomic status. As predicted, there was a large default effect. There were also interactions between the default condition and the three moderators; participants lower in these moderators were more impacted by defaults. These effects remained significant when adding survey engagement, comprehension, need for cognition, agreeableness, decision time, and their interactions with condition to the model as covariates.

Study 2 examines whether these effects generalized across three different types of nudges and three decision contexts. It replicated the SES and financial literacy effects of Study 1 across all nudges and contexts. Unlike Study 1 and all subsequent studies, the nudge x numeracy interaction was not significant. The key effects remained significant when controlling for a measure of fluid intelligence.

Study 3 uses syndicated data from stratified random samples of American households about their retirement investment decisions to examine a sample of people who work for companies that use defaults to automatically enroll employees into retirement contributions. Respondents reported whether they retained or opted out of the default contribution amount and default investment allocation. Evidence supports that lower-SES and less financially literate people are more impacted by nudges and thus less likely to opt out of these retirement defaults: Lower-SES participants were less likely to opt out as were participants with lower financial literacy.

Study 4 replicated these effects in the context of COVID-19 health decisions (e.g., deciding whether to wear a mask). Additionally, domain-specific health knowledge moderated default effects whereas other-domain knowledge did not. Studies 5-6 replicated the predicted moderators from Study 1 with incentives. Mediation models suggest that people with lower SES, domain knowledge, and numeracy were more impacted by nudges partly because they experience higher uncertainty and decision anxiety when making decisions.

Across the six studies, nudges influenced choice disparities across people. Posner summarizes the study by saying "Our results suggest that nudges that make behaviors such as retail purchases, vaccine sign-up, and retirement contributions more automatic can reduce socioeconomic inequities."

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Full article and author contact information available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/0022242921993186

About the Journal of Marketing

The Journal of Marketing develops and disseminates knowledge about real-world marketing questions useful to scholars, educators, managers, policy makers, consumers, and other societal stakeholders around the world. Published by the American Marketing Association since its founding in 1936, JM has played a significant role in shaping the content and boundaries of the marketing discipline. Christine Moorman (T. Austin Finch, Sr. Professor of Business Administration at the Fuqua School of Business, Duke University) serves as the current Editor in Chief. https://www.ama.org/jm

About the American Marketing Association (AMA)

As the largest chapter-based marketing association in the world, the AMA is trusted by marketing and sales professionals to help them discover what is coming next in the industry. The AMA has a community of local chapters in more than 70 cities and 350 college campuses throughout North America. The AMA is home to award-winning content, PCM® professional certification, premiere academic journals, and industry-leading training events and conferences. https://www.ama.org

How our microplastic waste becomes 'hubs' for pathogens, antibiotic-resistant bacteria

A new study shows how microplastics found in our daily personal care products can also host pathogens and boost antibiotic-resistant bacteria by up to 30 times once they wash down household drains and enter municipal wastewater treatment plants

NEW JERSEY INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

Research News

IMAGE: A SINGLE USE OF A FACIAL EXFOLIATOR CAN RELEASE 5,000 -100,000 MICROPLASTICS TO THE ENVIRONMENT. view more
CREDIT: NJIT

It's estimated that an average-sized wastewater treatment plant serving roughly 400,000 residents will discharge up to 2,000,000 microplastic particles into the environment each day. Yet, researchers are still learning the environmental and human health impact of these ultra-fine plastic particles, less than 5 millimeters in length, found in everything from cosmetics, toothpaste and clothing microfibers, to our food, air and drinking water.

Now, researchers at New Jersey Institute of Technology have shown that ubiquitous microplastics can become 'hubs' for antibiotic-resistant bacteria and pathogens to grow once they wash down household drains and enter wastewater treatment plants -- forming a slimy layer of buildup, or biofilm, on their surface that allows pathogenic microorganisms and antibiotic waste to attach and comingle.

In findings published in Elsevier's Journal of Hazardous Materials Letters, researchers found certain strains of bacteria elevated antibiotic resistance by up to 30 times while living on microplastic biofilms that can form inside activated sludge units at municipal wastewater treatment plants.

"A number of recent studies have focused on the negative impacts that millions of tons of microplastic waste a year is having on our freshwater and ocean environments, but until now the role of microplastics in our towns' and cities' wastewater treatment processes has largely been unknown," said Mengyan Li, associate professor of chemistry and environmental science at NJIT and the study's corresponding author. "These wastewater treatment plants can be hotspots where various chemicals, antibiotic-resistant bacteria and pathogens converge and what our study shows is that microplastics can serve as their carriers, posing imminent risks to aquatic biota and human health if they bypass the water treatment process."

"Most wastewater treatment plants are not designed for the removal of microplastics, so they are constantly being released into the receiving environment," added Dung Ngoc Pham, NJIT Ph.D. candidate and first author of the study. "Our goal was to investigate whether or not microplastics are enriching antibiotic-resistant bacteria from activated sludge at municipal wastewater treatment plants, and if so, learn more about the microbial communities involved."

In their study, the team collected batches of sludge samples from three domestic wastewater treatment plants in northern New Jersey, inoculating the samples in the lab with two widespread commercial microplastics -- polyethylene (PE) and polystyrene (PS). The team used a combination of quantitative PCR and next-generation sequencing techniques to identify the species of bacteria that tend to grow on the microplastics, tracking genetic changes of the bacteria along the way.

The analysis revealed that three genes in particular -- sul1, sul2 and intI1-- known to aid resistance to common antibiotics, sulfonamides, were found to be up to 30 times greater on the microplastic biofilms than in the lab's control tests using sand biofilms after just three days.

When the team spiked the samples with the antibiotic, sulfamethoxazole (SMX), they found it further amplified the antibiotic resistance genes by up to 4.5-fold.

"Previously, we thought the presence of antibiotics would be necessary to enhance antibiotic-resistance genes in these microplastic-associated bacteria, but it seems microplastics can naturally allow for uptake of these resistance genes on their own." said Pham. "The presence of antibiotics does have a significant multiplier effect however."

Eight different species of bacteria were found highly enriched on the microplastics. Among these species, the team observed two emerging human pathogens typically linked with respiratory infection, Raoultella ornithinolytica and Stenotrophomonas maltophilia, frequently hitchhiking on the microplastic biofilms.

The team say the most common strain found on the microplastics by far, Novosphingobium pokkalii, is likely a key initiator in forming the sticky biofilm that attracts such pathogens -- as it proliferates it may contribute to the deterioration of the plastic and expand the biofilm. At the same time, the team's study highlighted the role of the gene, intI1, a mobile genetic element chiefly responsible for enabling the exchange of antibiotic resistance genes among the microplastic-bound microbes.

"We might think of microplastics as tiny beads, but they provide an enormous surface area for microbes to reside," explained Li. "When these microplastics enter the wastewater treatment plant and mix in with sludge, bacteria like Novosphingobium can accidentally attach to the surface and secrete glue-like extracellular substances. As other bacteria attach to the surface and grow, they can even swap DNA with each other. This is how the antibiotic resistance genes are being spread among the community."

"We have evidence that the bacteria developed resistance to other antibiotics this way as well, such as aminoglycoside, beta-lactam and trimethoprim," added Pham.

Now, Li says the lab is further studying the role of Novosphingobium in biofilm formation on microplastics. The team is also seeking to better understand the extent to which such pathogen-carrying microplastics may be bypassing water treatment processes, by studying resistance of microplastic biofilms during wastewater treatment with disinfectants such as UV light and chlorine.

"Some states are already considering new regulations on the use of microplastics in consumer products. This study raises calls for further investigation on microplastic biofilms in our wastewater systems and development of effective means for removing microplastics in aquatic environments," said Li.

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Saturday, March 20, 2021

Illinois youth opioid use linked with other substance misuse, mental health issues

Study shows stronger brain activity after writing on paper than on tablet or smartphone

Real "doodles of light" in real-time mark leap for holograms at home

Christmas Island reptile-killer identified

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How our microplastic waste becomes 'hubs' for pathogens, antibiotic-resistant bacteria

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