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Probing Individual Particles in Aquatic Suspensions by Simultaneously Measuring Polarized Light Scattering and Fluorescence
Summary
Researchers developed a portable optical sensor that simultaneously measures polarized light scattering and fluorescence from individual particles in water, enabling classification of microplastics versus microalgae in situ. This dual-measurement approach improves particle identification accuracy compared to single-measurement methods.
Suspended particles play a significant role in aquatic systems. However, existing methods to probe suspended particles have several limitations. In this paper, we present a portable prototype to in situ probe individual particles in aquatic suspensions by simultaneously measuring polarized light scattering and fluorescence, aiming to obtain an effective classification of microplastics and microalgae. Results show that the obtained classification accuracy is significantly higher than that for either of these two methods. The setup also successfully measures submicron particles and discriminates two species of Synechococcus. Our study demonstrates the feasibility of simultaneously measuring polarized light scattering and fluorescence, and the promising capability of our method for further aquatic environmental monitoring.
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