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Quantifying the Dynamics of Polystyrene Microplastics\nUV-Aging Process
Summary
Researchers used single-particle ICP-MS to quantitatively track UV-aging of polystyrene microplastics, finding particles shrank from 5 to 1 µm while particle number concentration tripled, with pristine particles causing acute toxicity and aged particles inducing chronic reproductive inhibition in Daphnia magna.
Massive\namounts of plastic waste have been released into ecosystems,\ngenerating huge amounts of microplastics (MPs) and nanoplastics (NPs)\nduring the environmental aging process. However, particle size and\nnumber dynamics along the aging process have not been quantitatively\nassessed, which can greatly influence their fate and environmental\nrisk assessment. We applied single particle inductively coupled plasma\nmass spectroscopy (spICP-MS) to quantitatively analyze the polystyrene\n(PS) MPs aging process with a wide particle size range (800 nm–5\nμm) as well as particle number concentration at an environmentally\nrelevant value (down to 7.1 × 106 particles/L). We\ninvestigated the UV-light accelerated aging dynamics of PS MPs and\nrevealed the generation of large amounts of nano/microsize PS MPs\nfragments. PS MPs showed a rapid size downtrend along the aging process,\nshrinking from 5 to 1 μm. At the same time, PS MPs particle\nnumber concentration increased 3 times. Furthermore, pristine PS MPs\nmay induce acute toxicity in feeding behavior, growth, and survival,\nwhile aged ones caused marked chronic toxicity on the reproduction\ninhibition of Daphnia magna, both at environmentally\nrelevant concentrations. Overall, the research uncovered and quantified\nMPs particle size and concentration during the aging process, which\nis essential to assessing ecotoxicological risks of MPs/NPs.
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