Microplastics in freshwaters and drinking water: Critical review and assessment of data quality.

Microplastics are ubiquitous across ecosystems, yet the exposure risk to humans is unresolved. Focusing on the American diet, we evaluated the number of microplastic particles in commonly consumed ...

Human Consumption of Microplastics

Microplastics, defined as plastic particles smaller than 5 mm, are ubiquitous in natural environments. They are increasingly polluting aqueous, terrestrial, and airborne environments, and there hav...

Detection of Various Microplastics in Human Stool: A Prospective Case Series.

On account of environmental concerns, the fate and adverse effects of plastics have attracted considerable interest in the past few years. Recent studies have indicated the potential for fragmentation of plastic materials into nanoparticles, i.e., "nanoplastics," and their possible accumulation in the environment. Nanoparticles can show markedly different chemical and physical properties than their bulk material form. Therefore possible risks and hazards to the environment need to be considered and addressed. However, the fate and effect of nanoplastics in the (aquatic) environment has so far been little explored. In this review, we aim to provide an overview of the literature on this emerging topic, with an emphasis on the reported impacts of nanoplastics on human health, including the challenges involved in detecting plastics in a biological environment. We first discuss the possible sources of nanoplastics and their fates and effects in the environment and then describe the possible entry routes of these particles into the human body, as well as their uptake mechanisms at the cellular level. Since the potential risks of environmental nanoplastics to humans have not yet been extensively studied, we focus on studies demonstrating cell responses induced by polystyrene nanoparticles. In particular, the influence of particle size and surface chemistry are discussed, in order to understand the possible risks of nanoplastics for humans and provide recommendations for future studies.

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Emergence of Nanoplastic in the Environment and Possible Impact on Human Health

The increasing presence of micro- and nano-sized plastics in the environment and food chain is of growing concern. Although mindful consumers are promoting the reduction of single-use plastics, some manufacturers are creating new plastic packaging to replace traditional paper uses, such as plastic teabags. The objective of this study was to determine whether plastic teabags could release microplastics and/or nanoplastics during a typical steeping process. We show that steeping a single plastic teabag at brewing temperature (95 °C) releases approximately 11.6 billion microplastics and 3.1 billion nanoplastics into a single cup of the beverage. The composition of the released particles is matched to the original teabags (nylon and polyethylene terephthalate) using Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). The levels of nylon and polyethylene terephthalate particles released from the teabag packaging are several orders of magnitude higher than plastic loads pr...

Plastic Teabags Release Billions of Microparticles and Nanoparticles into Tea.

Eleven globally sourced brands of bottled water, purchased in 19 locations in 9 different countries, were tested for microplastic contamination using Nile Red tagging Of the 259 total bottles processed, 93% showed some sign of microplastic contamination After accounting for possible background (lab) contamination, an average of 104 microplastic particles >100 um in size per liter of bottled water processed were found Fragments were the most common morphology (66%) followed by fibers Half of these particles were confirmed to be polymeric in nature using FTIR spectroscopy with polypropylene being the most common polymer type (54%), which matches a common plastic used for the manufacture of bottle caps A small fraction of particles (4%) showed the presence of industrial lubricants While spectroscopic analysis of particles smaller than 100 um was not possible, the adsorption of the Nile Red dye indicates that these particles are most probably plastic Including these smaller particles (65–100 um), an average of 325 microplastic particles per liter of bottled water was found Microplastic contamination range of 0 to over 10,000 microplastic particles per liter with 95% of particles being between 65–100 um in size Data suggests the contamination is at least partially coming from the packaging and/or the bottling process itself Given the prevalence of the consumption of bottled water across the globe, the results of this study support the need for further studies on the impacts of micro- and nano- plastics on human health

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Joseph Neratko

Papers

Synthetic Polymer Contamination in Bottled Water