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Microplastics transport in soils: A critical review
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This critical review examined how microplastics are transported through soils, evaluating the role of particle size and shape, soil texture, water flow, and bioturbation in governing vertical and lateral transport. The authors identify knowledge gaps in field-scale transport processes and call for standardized leaching experiments to improve predictions of microplastic mobility in terrestrial systems.
Microplastics (MPs) in terrestrial environments are an emerging contaminant of huge concernto ecosystems and human health. However, our understanding of the MPs fate, particularly their transport mechanisms, remains elusive. This knowledge gap arises from the multiplicity of coupled physical, chemical and biological processes and parameters affecting MPs transport, together with scarcity of systematic studies that aim to isolate their individual effects. In this paper, we provide a critical review of the state-of-the-art in our understanding of MPs transport, highlight knowledge gaps, and suggest future research to bridge them. We classify the governing factors into four main categories: (i) MPs properties; (ii) soil properties; (iii) hydrological conditions; and (iv) biological activity. Our analysis highlights the intricacy of MPs transport, showing that seemingly non-monotonic trends and even complete lack of correlation between some parameters and MPs transport could be explained by the interference (co-effects) with other parameters and processes
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