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"This book highlights plastic disposal especially microplastics and the consequences on environment and reaching human diet through food chain/ web transmission and contamination through processing and packaging of various human food items including water and beverages. This book provides a detailed outlook on the microplastics, their origin, distribution, categories, presence in human food items and their impact on ecosystem, organisms and so forth. It covers updated information on microplastics contamination in the biotic and abiotic products of sea/ocean, the contamination of microplastics in the drinking water / bottled water, honey, sugar and so forth. Features: Discusses the presence of microplastics in matrices prone for human consumption. Includes generic information on microplastics, their origin, types, shapes, size and nomenclature. Reviews microplastics in different types of human consumable items. Illustrates fundamental methods and techniques used in microplastics research. Explores overall impacts of microplastics in the organisms contaminated with the same. This book aims at Researchers, and Graduate students in Microplastics, Environmental Science, Food Consumption and Analysis"--

By KIM BELLARD It's been almost four years since I first wrote about microplastics; long story short, they're everywhere. In the ground, in the oceans (even at the very bottom), in theContinue reading...

Marine debris is widely recognized as a global environmental problem. One of its main components, microplastics, has been found in several sea salt samples from different countries, indicating that sea products are irremediably contaminated by microplastics. Previous studies show very confusing results, reporting amounts of microparticles (MPs) in salt ranging from zero to 680 MPs/kg, with no mention of the possible causes of such differences. Several errors in the experimental procedures used were found and are reported in the present work. Likewise, 21 different samples of commercial table salt from Spain have been analyzed for MPs content and nature. The samples comprise sea salts and well salts, before and after packing. The microplastic content found was of 50–280 MPs/kg salt, being polyethylene-terephthalate (PET) the most frequently found polymer, followed by polypropylene (PP) and polyethylene (PE), with no significant differences among all the samples. The results indicate that even though the micro-particles might originate from multiple sources, there is a background presence of microplastics in the environment. ; Support for this work was provided by the CTQ2016-76608-R project from the Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness (Spain) and the PROMETEOII/2014/007 project from the Valencian Community Government (Spain). The author M.E. Iñiguez also thanks the Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness (Spain) for a Ph.D. grant (contract grant number BES-2014-069473).

"Plastics are considered to be one of the greatest industrial inventions of the last century, which are widely used and bring great convenience. As global demand grows, global plastic production continues to increase, for example exceeding 350 billion tons in 2018. However, the convenience of plastics has also sparked a throw-away mentality, leading to a large amount of plastic waste entering various environments as plastic pollution. It is estimated that total release of plastics will reach 250 million tons by 2025. The discharged plastics in the environment will gradually be decomposed to plastic particles under various environmental stressors such as sunlight, weathering and erosion. Among them, those with a particle size in the range of 0.1 mm to 5 mm are considered as microplastics. In addition, small artificial plastic particles added to personal products are also a major source of microplastics. Massive usage of plastic products and poor management of plastic waste disposal have resulted in the release of large quantities of microplastics into the environment. Moreover, microplastics are hardly degradable through weathering and aging; they therefore accumulate and persist in the various environments for years to decades. Urban waters such as lakes, river, wastewater, drinking water and others are closely related to human production and life, which are considered to be the important paths of microplastics migration and accumulation. Microplastics have been frequently and significantly detected in different urban waters such as wastewater, wastewater treatment plant effluent, surface water and drinking water. Microplastics have been demonstrated to induce chronic toxicity to living organisms after ingestion, and this potentially toxic effect could be transmitted to the human body through the food chain, posing a potential threat to aquatic species and human health. Therefore, microplastics have aroused increasing concerns, and the problems and its potential risks are considered more serious than plastic pollution"--

Front Cover -- Microplastics -- Copyright Page -- Contents -- List of contributors -- About the editors -- Preface -- Section I Introduction -- 1 Microplastics contamination in soil, water, air, and environmental health risk assessment -- 1.1 Introduction -- 1.2 Current status of microplastic pollution -- 1.3 Origin and sources of microplastics -- 1.3.1 Sources and migration of microplastic in soil -- 1.3.2 Sources and migration of microplastic in water -- 1.3.3 Sources and migration of microplastic in air -- 1.3.4 Methods of identification of microplastics -- 1.3.4.1 Samples collected from the aquatic environment -- 1.3.4.2 Sampling from the sediment -- 1.4 Impact of microplastics -- 1.4.1 Interactions between microplastics and environmental pollutants -- 1.4.2 Interactions of microplastics with organic pollutants -- 1.4.3 Interactions between microplastics with heavy metals -- 1.5 Effects of microplastics in soil -- 1.5.1 Impact of microplastics on the soil structure -- 1.5.2 Influence of microplastics on the physicochemical properties of soil structure -- 1.5.3 Interactions of microplastics between soil organisms and plants -- 1.6 Effects of microplastics in water -- 1.7 Ecological risk of air pollutants -- 1.8 Future prospects -- 1.9 Conclusion -- References -- 2 Microplastics in the food chain -- 2.1 Introduction -- 2.2 Types of microplastics -- 2.3 Synthetic polymer as a source of microplastics -- 2.4 Route of human exposure to synthetic polymers -- 2.5 Impact of microplastics on food chain -- 2.6 Impacts of microplastics on various environmental conditions -- 2.6.1 Potential effect of microplastics on agroecosystems plants and animals and their trophic transfer in the food chain -- 2.6.2 Impacts of microplastics on microorganisms -- 2.6.3 Impacts of microplastics on agriculture ecosystem micro and macro elements.

"The Impact and Remediation of Microplastics Pollution. Microplastic contamination is an increasing societal and environmental concern worldwide, with microplastic particles found in various terrestrial ecosystems, landfills, and even agricultural soil, infiltrating the food chain and causing risks to living organisms. This book summarizes the emergence of microplastics (MPs) as pollutants in soil ecosystems and provides a fundamental introduction to MPs in general (the origin, makeup and features). It also describes emerging bioremediation techniques and potential future directions, particularly for consideration within developing nations. Global experts present the information in an accessible way, allowing readers from diverse backgrounds to develop a solid foundation for understanding remediation options and future prevention of this challenging problem."--

Chapter 1_ Navigating Microplastic Challenges: Separation and Detection Strategies in Wastewater Treatment -- Chapter 2_ Microplastics detection techniques -- Chapter 3_ Microplastics in Soil: Unveiling the Threat within Earth's Crucial Ecosystem -- Chapter 4_ Microplastics in the aquatic environment -- Chapter 5_ Microplastics in terrestrial ecosystems -- Chapter 6_ Microplastic in Glacier Region: Presence, Distribution and Possible Sources -- Chapter 7_ Microplastics in crops -- Chapter 8_ Microplastics in foods -- Chapter 9_ Microplastics in Personal Care Products and Cosmetics -- Chapter 10_ Microplastic in Air and their Health Hazard -- Chapter 11_ Microplastics and Microbe interaction on Human and Animal Health.-Chapter 12_ Microplastics in Human Health -- Chapter 13_ Microplastics in Landfill and Leachate -- Chapter 14_ Environmental risks and hazards of microplastics -- Chapter 15_ Sustainable management of microplastics.

Abstract
The omnipresence of microplastics (MPs) in marine and terrestrial environments as a pollutant of concern is well established and widely discussed in the literature. However, studies on MP contamination in commercial food sources like salts from the terrestrial environment are scarce. Thus, this is the first study to investigate various varieties of Australian commercial salts (both terrestrial and marine salts) as a source of MPs in the human diet, and the first to detect MPs in black salt. Using Nile red dye, the MPs were detected and counted under light microscopy, further characterised using attenuated total reflectance Fourier transformed infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR) and scanning electron microscopy and energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (SEM–EDS). Of all the 90 suspected particles, 78.8% were identified as MPs with a size ranging between 23.2 µm and 3.9 mm. The fibres and fragments constituted 75.78% and 24.22% respectively. Among the tested samples, Himalayan pink salt (coarse) from terrestrial sources was found to have the highest MP load, i.e. 174.04 ± 25.05 (SD) particle/kg, followed by black salt at 157.41 ± 23.13 particle/kg. The average concentration of detected MPs in Australian commercial salts is 85.19 ± 63.04 (SD) per kg. Polyamide (33.8%) and polyurethane (30.98%) were the dominant MP types. Considering the maximum recommended (World Health Organization) salt uptake by adults daily at 5 g, we interpret that an average person living in Australia may be ingesting approximately 155.47 MPs/year from salt uptake. Overall, MP contamination was higher in terrestrial salts (such as black and Himalayan salt) than the marine salt. In conclusion, we highlight those commercial salts used in our daily lives serve as sources of MPs in the diet, with unknown effects on human health.

Microplastics are ubiquitous and their sampling is a difficult task. Honeybees interact with the environment inside their foraging range and take pollutants with them. In this work, we demonstrated for the first time that worker bees can act as active samplers of microplastics. We collected honeybees from apiaries located in the centre of Copenhagen and from nearby semiurban and rural areas. We showed the presence of microplastics in all sampled locations mostly in the form of fragments (52%) and fibres (38%) with average equivalent diameter of 64 ± 39 μm for fibres and 234 ± 156 μm for fragments. The highest load corresponded to urban apiaries, but comparable number of microplastics was found in hives from suburban and rural areas, which can be explained by the presence of urban settlements inside the foraging range of worker bees and to the easy dispersion of small microplastics by wind. Micro-FTIR analysis confirmed the presence of thirteen synthetic polymers, the most frequently of which was polyester followed by polyethylene and polyvinyl chloride. Our results demonstrated the presence of microplastics attached to the body of the honeybees and opens a new research pathway to their use as active biosamplers for anthropogenic pollution ; The authors acknowledge the financial support provided by the Spanish Government: CTM2016-74927-C2-1-R/2-R, and the Thematic Network of Micro- and Nanoplastics in the Environment (RED2018-102345-T, EnviroPlaNet Network). CE thanks the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities for the award of a pre-doctoral grant (FPI)