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Critical review on microplastics in fecal matter: Research progress, analytical methods and future outlook

The Science of The Total Environment 2021 84 citations ? Citation count from OpenAlex, updated daily. May differ slightly from the publisher's own count. Score: 45 ? 0–100 AI score estimating relevance to the microplastics field. Papers below 30 are filtered from public browse.
V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, V.C. Shruti, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, V.C. Shruti, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, V.C. Shruti, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, V.C. Shruti, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, V.C. Shruti Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, V.C. Shruti Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Fermín Pérez‐Guevara, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, V.C. Shruti Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, V.C. Shruti Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, V.C. Shruti Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, Gurusamy Kutralam-Muniasamy, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti V.C. Shruti, V.C. Shruti

Summary

This critical review synthesizes methods and findings from microplastic research in fecal matter across diverse organisms, highlighting the need for standardized analytical methods to enable comparisons of microplastic passage and excretion rates.

There has been an ever-increasing attention over years for investigating microplastics in feces of lower to higher trophic organisms from diverse environments. Focusing on the standardization of methodologies for reliable generation and comparison of data is one of the important aspects in microplastic area. This first review, comprising 20 studies in total, critically summarizes and compares the methodological approaches for the determination of microplastics in feces as well outlines the levels and characteristics of microplastics detected in feces worldwide. Contaminations and QA/QC measures are also discussed. Despite variations among the approaches, most studies (n = 12) described herein rely on the digestion processes involving HO (n = 7) and KOH (n = 6) for the separation of microplastics, whereas very few included wet sieving (n = 5), density separation using NaCl (n = 3) and NaI (n = 1) and enzymatic digestion (n = 2). Microscopical sorting and spectroscopic methods such as infrared and Raman were combined for identification and characterization of microplastics. The detected microplastics varied by size, shape, color and polymer types and the differences in reporting units of microplastic abundance make comparison across studies difficult. Taking advantage of the current knowledge, our review identified analytical challenges and suggested appropriate methods on research into microplastic contamination in feces. This work will serve as a valuable information of available analytical methods for examining microplastics in feces and will stimulate further research to advance our understanding of microplastics from feces.

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