Towards an enhanced understanding of the fate of microplastics in aquatic systems through improvement of analysis and reporting standards

Horton, Alice ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6058-6048. 2019 Towards an enhanced understanding of the fate of microplastics in aquatic systems through improvement of analysis and reporting standards. In: AGU Fall Meeting 2019, San Francisco, Ca, USA, 9-13 Dec 2019. San Francisco, Ca, USA, American Geophysical Union.

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Abstract/Summary

In recent years microplastics research has rapidly progressed, from simply identifying the presence of microplastics within environmental samples, to determining sources, abundances, chemical associations and ecological effects. Since the early research, there have been significant advances in the methods and techniques available and utilised by researchers in this field. Microplastics have been observed to cause harm to a range of organisms, with effects ranging from alteration of behaviour and inhibited reproduction to mortality. Hence there is the potential for large-scale ecosystem effects as a result of chronic environmental exposure. Further, concerns have also been raised about the potential human exposure to microplastics, and associated risks. Despite concerted research efforts, this is still a relatively new research area and thus many questions still remain. There is therefore a critical need to grow our understanding of microplastics: their behaviour, fate and chemical associations, in order to determine the real hazards they pose for ecosystems. Further, the term 'microplastics' encompasses a highly diverse range of plastic types, shapes and sizes, all of which will originate from different sources and behave differently within the environment. This poses a great challenge for microplastic researchers trying to understand the fate and effects of this pollutant. In order to further develop and address this wide variety of research questions, efforts must be made to streamline and align research in this field. This presentation will detail some of the recent advances in sampling, analysis and detection of microplastics in environmental samples, and some of the key considerations which must be taken into account for future research. This is especially important for complex organic-rich samples, where extraction is difficult and the possibility of reporting false positives or negatives is high.

Item Type:	Publication - Conference Item (Paper)
Date made live:	15 Feb 2021 15:41 +0 (UTC)
URI:	https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/529665

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