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Microplastics in the Freshwater and Earthbound Conditions: Prevalence, Destinies, Impacts, and Supportable Arrangements

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Microplastic sources, fate and solution

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Abstract

An increasing number of researches have been published on MPs’ different freshwater ecosystems worldwide, including lakes, rivers, estuaries, and wetlands in both waters and sediments. Although the literature on plastics in freshwater is growing, data are globally disjointed about the evidence of concentrations of MPs and impacts on environmental freshwater matrices (Cera et al. 2020). Besides, the heterogeneity of sampling protocols, methodologies, techniques, and measurement units among different researches makes it challenging to compare results and produce a complete picture of the existing state of understanding [1]. Another critical factor is that MPs < 100 μm (SMPs) are often overlooked; less than 20% of reported studies on freshwater environments reported MPs below 20 μm. The sampling and analytical procedures are strictly connected to detecting plastic particles sizes >100 μm. Consequently, most of the reported studies could have undervalued the concentration of SMPs. Thus, improvement in detection technologies and pre-treatments methods could modify the final mean amount of MPs in freshwater environments [2].

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Polar Sciences, National Research Council – CNR ISP, Venezia, Italy

    Elena Gregoris, Beatrice Rosso & Fabiana Corami

  2. Department of Environmental Sciences, Informatics and Statistics, DAIS, University of Ca’ Foscari, Venezia, Italy

    Elena Gregoris, Beatrice Rosso, Marco Roman & Fabiana Corami

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  1. Elena Gregoris
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  2. Beatrice Rosso
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  1. Center of Excellence for Advanced Materials Research, King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

    Anish Khan

  2. School of Chemical Engineering, Zhengzhou University, Zhengzhou City, China

    Chongqing Wang

  3. Center of Excellence for Advanced Materials Research, King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

    Abdullah M. Asiri

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Gregoris, E., Rosso, B., Roman, M., Corami, F. (2023). Microplastics in the Freshwater and Earthbound Conditions: Prevalence, Destinies, Impacts, and Supportable Arrangements. In: Khan, A., Wang, C., Asiri, A.M. (eds) Microplastic sources, fate and solution. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-0695-6_2

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