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Gold nanoparticle biodissolution by a freshwater macrophyte and its associated microbiome

Nature Nanotechnology volume 13, pages 1072–1077 (2018)Cite this article

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Abstract

Predicting nanoparticle fate in aquatic environments requires mimicking of ecosystem complexity to observe the geochemical processes affecting their behaviour. Here, 12 nm Au nanoparticles were added weekly to large-scale freshwater wetland mesocosms. After six months, ~70% of Au was associated with the macrophyte Egeria densa, where, despite the thermodynamic stability of Au0 in water, the pristine Au0 nanoparticles were fully oxidized and complexed to cyanide, hydroxyls or thiol ligands. Extracted biofilms growing on E. densa leaves were shown to dissolve Au nanoparticles within days. The Au biodissolution rate was highest for the biofilm with the lowest prevalence of metal-resistant taxa but the highest ability to release cyanide, known to promote Au0 oxidation and complexation. Macrophytes and the associated microbiome thus form a biologically active system that can be a major sink for nanoparticle accumulation and transformations. Nanoparticle biotransformation in these compartments should not be ignored, even for nanoparticles commonly considered to be stable in the environment.

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Fig. 1: Speciation of Au associated to E. densa from mesocosms chronically exposed to Au-NPs for six months.
Fig. 2: Au biodissolution potentials of the naive and the pre-exposed biofilms.
Fig. 3: Cyanide emission by biofilms and Au biodissolution.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank S. M. Anderson and B. P. Colman for their help setting up, monitoring and collecting samples during the experiment, S. Marinakos for providing TEM characterization of the Au-NPs, A. Curinier for insights and B. Perrotta for analyses of Au concentrations on mesocosm biofilms. This work was supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under NSF Cooperative Agreement EF-0830093 and DBI-1266252, Center for the Environmental Implications of NanoTechnology (CEINT). Funds for graduate student summer support was supplied by the Duke Wetland Center Endowment. Portions of this work were performed at the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource (SSRL) on beamline 11-2, a Department of Energy supported facility.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for the Environmental Implications of NanoTechnology (CEINT), Durham, NC, USA

    Astrid Avellan, Marie Simonin, Eric McGivney, Nathan Bossa, Eleanor Spielman-Sun, Emily S. Bernhardt, Nicholas K. Geitner, Jason M. Unrine, Mark R. Wiesner & Gregory V. Lowry

  2. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, USA

    Astrid Avellan, Eric McGivney, Eleanor Spielman-Sun & Gregory V. Lowry

  3. Department of Biology, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA

    Marie Simonin, Jennifer D. Rocca & Emily S. Bernhardt

  4. Civil & Environmental Engineering, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA

    Nathan Bossa, Nicholas K. Geitner & Mark R. Wiesner

  5. Department of Plant and Soil Sciences, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY, USA

    Jason M. Unrine

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Contributions

A.A., M.S., E.M., N.B., E.S.-S. and J.D.R. performed experiments and/or data analysis. A.A., M.S., E.S.B., N.K.G., M.R.W., J.M.U. and G.V.L. were involved in experimental design and writing. All authors discussed the results and commented on the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Gregory V. Lowry.

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Avellan, A., Simonin, M., McGivney, E. et al. Gold nanoparticle biodissolution by a freshwater macrophyte and its associated microbiome. Nature Nanotech 13, 1072–1077 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41565-018-0231-y

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