Microplastic shape influences soil greenhouse gas emission through its effect on bacterial community

Microplastics have increasingly become a focus of attention because they are new emerging pollutants that influence ecosystem functioning. Despite a few papers examining the effect of different types and rates of microplastics on soil greenhouse gas emissions, our understanding is still limited regarding the responses to different shapes of microplastics. We therefore evaluated the effects of different shapes of microplastic (fibers, films, and spheres) on CO2 and N2O emissions in three types of soils and tested their associations with the compositional and functional traits of soil bacterial communities. Our findings have important implications for the adoption of agricultural practices in consideration of climate warming and for model prediction of greenhouse gas emissions.