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Plastic particles are widely present in the natural environment and are highly likely to interact with bacteria (the ubiquitous microbes in the natural environment), which might affect the transport and deposition of bacteria in porous media. In this study, the significance of plastic particles from nanoscale to micrometer-scale (0.02–2 μm) on the transport and deposition behaviors of bacteria (Escherichia coli) in quartz sand was examined under environmentally relevant conditions in both NaCl and CaCl₂ solutions at pH 6. The results showed that the presence of different-sized plastic particles did not affect bacterial transport behaviors at low ionic strength (10 mM NaCl and 1 mM CaCl₂), whereas, at high ionic strength conditions (50 mM NaCl and 5 mM in CaCl₂), plastic particles increased bacterial transport in quartz sand. At low ionic strength conditions, the mobility of both plastic particles and bacteria was high, which …