Since 1950, 76% of all plastic waste ever produced has been discarded into dumps, landfills, or the natural environment. Due to photodegradation and mechanical wear, much of this environmental plastic ultimately fragments into smaller pieces of waste called microplastics (particles between 5mm and 1µm). Freshwater systems are recognized as the primary conduit for microplastic transport across terrestrial systems and ultimately to the ocean. Despite this, standard investigations of microplastics in freshwater systems are often characterized by sampling-regime limitations and methodological issues regarding microplastics collection, which constrain the ability of investigators to understand the spatiotemporal variability of microplastics in these systems at sufficient resolution. Here, a suite of novel fluorescence equipment and methodologies are developed to extract and quantify microplastics from surface water and sediment samples. Equipment and protocols were designed to minimize sample processing costs and time, reliance on specialized equipment, and maximize ease of operation. This equipment is trialed in an exploratory sediment core from Jordan Lake to demonstrate the capabilities of the equipment.
Riley Moran (Fri,) studied this question.