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Interaction, Adhesion and Aggregation of Microplastic/Nanoplastic Particles: Effects of Plastic Polymer Type
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This review examines how polymer type, particle size, shape, pH, ionic strength, and salt composition influence the interaction, adhesion, and aggregation behavior of microplastics and nanoplastics in aquatic and soil environments. The paper synthesizes findings on homoaggregation and heteroaggregation with natural and engineered nanoparticles, highlighting how aggregation affects particle transport and environmental fate.
Microplastics (MP; <5 mm) and nanoplastics (NP; <1000 nm) are now ubiquitous in nature as they have been released into inland water, lakes, rivers, and marine water through direct discharge, runoff from upland watersheds, and other terrestrial environments. To understand the aggregation of MP and NP in the last decade, surveys and analytical efforts were undertaken. The MP and NP particles in the soil and water environments interact with other natural and engineered nanoparticles, which in turn form aggregates. These plastic particles could form homoaggregates and/or heteroaggregates depending on pH, ionic type, ionic valence, salt concentration, shape and size of the plastic particles, and the polymer type of MP. Differences in MP aggregation due to differences in plastic polymer type are not yet well documented. This review is conducted to investigate the effect of polymer type on the aggregation of MP and NP particles in the presence of various aggregation conditions.
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This study investigated the aggregation behavior of micro- and nanoparticles including microplastics in aquatic systems, developing mechanistic models to understand how water chemistry and particle properties determine whether plastic particles clump together or remain dispersed — affecting their environmental fate and toxicity.
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Interactions between nanoplastics and suspended sediment were studied in NaCl solutions, finding that large sediment particles significantly enhanced settling of nanoplastics through heteroaggregation, with the effect increasing at higher ionic strength. The study reveals how sediment-nanoplastic aggregation drives vertical transport and burial of nanoplastics in aquatic environments.
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This chapter reviews how microplastics aggregate with each other and with natural particles like sediment and algae in water, affecting their transport, fate, and biological availability. Heteroaggregation with natural colloids is more common than microplastic-to-microplastic clumping, which has important implications for how microplastics move through aquatic environments.
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