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Super-resolution imaging of micro- and nanoplastics using confocal Raman with Gaussian surface fitting and deconvolution
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Researchers used confocal Raman imaging with Gaussian surface fitting to achieve super-resolution visualization of micro- and nanoplastics beyond the optical diffraction limit, enabling identification and imaging of nanoplastic particles smaller than conventional Raman microscopy can resolve.
Confocal Raman imaging can directly identify and visualise microplastics and even nanoplastics. However, due to diffraction, the excitation laser spot has a size, which defines the image resolution. Consequently, it is difficult to image nanoplastic that is smaller than the diffraction limit. Within the laser spot, fortunately, the excitation energy density behaves an axially transcended distribution, or a 2D Gaussian distribution. By mapping the emission intensity of Raman signal, the imaged nanoplastic pattern is axially transcended as well and can be fitted as a 2D Gaussian surface via deconvolution, to re-construct the Raman image. The image re-construction can intentionally and selectively pick up the weak signal of nanoplastics, average the background noise/the variation of the Raman intensity, smoothen the image surface and re-focus the mapped pattern towards signal enhancement. Using this approach, along with nanoplastics models with known size for validation, real samples are also tested to image microplastics and nanoplastics released from the bushfire-burned face masks and water tanks. Even the bushfire-deviated surface group can be visualised as well, to monitor the different degrees of burning by visualising micro- and nanoplastics. Overall, this approach can effectively image regular shape of micro- and nanoplastics, capture nanoplastics smaller than the diffraction limit, and realise super-resolution imaging via confocal Raman.
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Super-resolution Raman imaging was evaluated as a method to visualize nanoplastics smaller than the conventional diffraction-limited laser spot size, overcoming a key barrier in nanoplastic characterization. The technique extends confocal Raman capabilities into the nanoscale detection range needed for environmental nanoplastic analysis.
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Researchers examined whether confocal Raman microscopy can identify and visualize nanoplastics smaller than the diffraction limit of the laser, analyzing the lateral intensity distribution of Raman signals from nanoplastics ranging from approximately 30 to 600 nm in diameter. The study found that while imaging resolution is limited by diffraction, chemical identification of sub-diffraction-limit nanoplastics remains possible.
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