At-site microplastic monitoring for rivers and marine environments

Plastics are ubiquitous and there is an urgent need to better manage their life cycle from production to environmental fate. Recent interest has focussed on very small (micro and nano) plastics, including their detection in and potential deleterious impact on the environment. Tools currently available for studying these particles are inadequate to answer a wide range of pressing questions including: How do they form? How are they dispersed through the environment? What are their concentrations in the environment? This project will develop sampling and sample preparation protocols for a novel analytical tool to begin to address these pressing questions and to underpin future research in this area.
Resistive Pulse Sensors (RPS) are a method of rapid data extraction/analysis of water samples with the resolution of a single micro to nanoparticles. With appropriate sample preparation, they are capable of screening large volumes of liquid for a single or billions of particles/ polymers in complex samples at source. This project will first develop such protocols for a novel portable, autonomous and fully integrated, RPS device and use it for monitoring the number, properties and degradation products of plastic particles in the environment. The CDT provides a unique research opportunity for testing the device in locations currently sampled by partners, and the ability to test this under controlled conditions in the 'River Science Laboratory'.
The potential effects of nanoplastics in the environment are not well quantified because the generation, transport and fate of these particles in aquatic systems is currently poorly understood. This project will thus also undertake state-of-the-art research in the River Science Laboratory' flume facility to characterise the transport and depositional processes that micro and nanoplastics are subject to in order to develop sampling protocols for monitoring the full range environmental microplastics in river and marine settings. The project will allow direct comparison of results obtained from samples collected in different settings, as well as from particles synthesised in the laboratory to those obtained in the natural environment. This will allow characterisation and monitoring of particles covering the whole life-cycle from production to environmental fate.