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A method for the extraction of microplastics from solid samples using olive oil
Summary
Researchers developed a new method using olive oil to extract microplastics from soil and sediment samples, exploiting the fact that plastics are oleophilic (oil-attracting). The method successfully recovered 11 different polymer types including dense plastics that are often missed by standard water-based density separation, offering a simpler and cheaper extraction approach.
Microplastics (MPs) extraction from sediment, sand and soil samples is a challenge that the scientific community is facing nowadays; currently there are no standardized and validated protocols and the most common methods rely on density separation techniques, often unable to separate high density polymers. The aim of the present work was to develop a non-density based, efficient and cost effective method. We tested an oil based extracting technique exploiting the oleophilic properties of plastic. Soil and marine and freshwater sand samples were spiked with 11 different kind of polymers: Polypropylene (PP), low density Polyethylene (LDPE), high density Polyethylene (HDPE), Polyurethane (PU), Polyethylene terephthalate (PET), Polystyrene (PS), Polycarbonate (PC), Polyamide (PA), Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC), Polymethyl Methacrylate (PMMA) and Polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE). FTIR preliminary results show high recovery rates for almost all polymers except for PTFE. Further developments of this promising method are currently in progress.