Figure 5.

Succession of the biofilm community on polyethylene (PE) after 1–2 weeks in the Tropical Atlantic Ocean (True Blue Bay), Grenada, West Indies (a, b) and in the Wadden Sea, Texel, The Netherlands, EU (c, d). The black background is the surface of the plastic pieces. Ellipitical white structures are phytoplankton cells attached to the PE surface, and are visible due to their autofluorecent pigments such as chlorophyll a. Variously coloured smaller cells are bacteria hybridzed with phylogenetic probes targeting different levels of taxonomic resolution as indicated in the legend. Greyish material in the week 2 sample of the Tropical Atlantic Ocean (b) are unidentified organic material (perhaps biofilm EPS) with captured autofluorescent pigments making these structures visible