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MicroPlasticFate web application: Multimedia environmental fate modelling of microplastic particles via the Enalos Cloud Platform

Bioresource Technology Reports 2025 4 citations ? Citation count from OpenAlex, updated daily. May differ slightly from the publisher's own count.
Constantinos Papavasiliou, Dimitris G. Mintis, Andreas Tsoumanis, Athina Karaoli, Iseult Lynch, Stefan Krause, Dimitra‐Danai Varsou, Georgia Melagraki, Mihalis Kavousanakis, Antreas Afantitis

Summary

Researchers developed a free web application called MicroPlasticFate that lets scientists and regulators model how plastic particles — including polypropylene, PET, and polyethylene — move through air, water, soil, and sediment on regional to global scales. The tool requires no coding expertise and includes an API so it can connect with other databases, making it easier to assess environmental plastic persistence without specialized software.

Polymers
LDPE PE PET PP
Study Type Environmental

The MicroPlasticFate web application is presented in this work, a user-friendly web tool, developed to simulate the fate and behaviour of nano- and microplastics (NMPs) in diverse environmental media/compartments. This application hosted on the Enalos cloud platform: https://www.enaloscloud.novamechanics.com/EnalosWebApps/MicroPlasticFate/ , replicates the core features of the SimpleBox4Plastic (SB4P) multimedia environmental fate model. It enables users to model the fate and transport of NMPs across multiple environmental scales, including regional, continental and global scale, each of which consists of compartments/media of air, soil, water and sediment. MicroPlasticFate integrates functionalities for in-depth exploration of the environmental persistence of three widely used plastics — Polypropylene (PP), Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET) and Low-Density Polyethylene (LDPE) — which do not exist as predefined substances in SB4P. Moreover, the web application offers the examination of the fate factors (FF i,j ) of NMPs that represent the increase of a substance mass in environmental compartment i due to emissions in compartment j (measured in days). MicroPlasticFate web application features also, the computation of the proportion of a given substance's volume within a specified compartment at steady-state, providing a comprehensive understanding of NMPs distribution patterns. This web tool eliminates the need for coding expertise by integrating a Graphical User Interface (GUI), enhancing user accessibility and interaction. MicroPlasticFate also offers an Application Programming Interface (API) that enables interoperability with external software and databases for expanding its utility in scientific research, environmental monitoring and regulatory risk assessments. • MicroPlasticFate replicates SimpleBox4Plastic's multimedia environmental fate model • User-friendly web tool to simulate microplastic fate in environmental compartments • Calculated steady state concentrations of PP, PET and LDPE per compartment • Web tool calculates proportion of a substance's volume in a specified compartment • MicroPlasticFate's API enables integration with external software and databases.

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