Papers

Interactions between microplastics, pharmaceuticals and personal care products: Implications for vector transport

This review examines how microplastics can absorb pharmaceuticals and personal care products (like medications, sunscreen, and antibacterials) onto their surfaces in the environment. Environmental factors like water acidity, salt levels, and organic matter all affect how strongly these chemicals bind to plastic surfaces. When organisms ingest microplastics carrying these absorbed chemicals, the combined exposure could pose greater health risks than either the plastics or chemicals alone.

Microplastics and plastics-associated contaminants in food and beverages; Global trends, concentrations, and human exposure

This review provides a global overview of microplastic contamination in food and beverages, including seafood, salt, honey, sugar, beer, milk, and drinking water. It estimates that humans may consume tens of thousands of microplastic particles per year through their diet, with concentrations varying widely by food type and region. The authors also examine plastics-associated chemicals like phthalates and bisphenol A that can leach from packaging into food, compounding the health risk.

Occurrence and abundance of microplastics and plasticizers in landfill leachate from open dumpsites in Sri Lanka

This is the first study to investigate microplastics and chemical plasticizers in landfill leachate and sediment in Sri Lanka. Researchers found microplastics in all ten open dump sites tested, with polyethylene and polypropylene being the most common types, along with harmful plasticizers like phthalates. This matters for human health because leachate from open dumps can contaminate nearby groundwater and surface water used for drinking and agriculture.

Nanomaterials for microplastics remediation in wastewater: A viable step towards cleaner water

This review examines how nanomaterials, tiny engineered particles with high surface area and reactivity, can be used to remove microplastics from water more effectively than traditional methods like filtration and sedimentation. While promising, these technologies face challenges including high production costs, potential toxicity of the nanomaterials themselves, and difficulty scaling up from lab to real-world applications. Improving these methods is important because current water treatment often fails to remove the smallest and most harmful microplastic particles.

Assessing the impact of micro and nanoplastics on the productivity of vegetable crops in terrestrial horticulture: a comprehensive review

This review summarizes research on how micro and nanoplastics accumulate in farmland and get absorbed by vegetable crops through their roots, building up in the edible parts of the plants. The plastic particles cause toxic effects that stunt plant growth by disrupting cellular processes and gene activity. This means the vegetables people eat may contain microplastics picked up from contaminated soil.

Nanoplastic occurrence, transformation and toxicity: a review

Global perspective on microplastics in landfill leachate; Occurrence, abundance, characteristics, and environmental impact

This review provides the first global overview of microplastic contamination in landfill leachate, the liquid that seeps out of garbage dumps. Microplastic levels varied widely, with the highest concentrations found in Shanghai at 291 particles per liter, and polyethylene was the most common type worldwide. Since landfill leachate can seep into groundwater and nearby waterways, this represents an important but often overlooked source of microplastic pollution that could affect drinking water supplies.

Microplastics in aquatic environment: fate, human exposure, removal and advances of nanotechnology in remediation

Influence of Aging and the Presence of Dissolved Organic Matter on Caffeine Adsorption onto Microplastics in Aquatic Environments

Researchers studied how aged polyethylene microplastics adsorb caffeine in water containing dissolved organic matter. They found that aged microplastics adsorbed significantly more caffeine than pristine ones, and that higher concentrations of humic acid enhanced adsorption further. The study suggests that as microplastics weather in the environment, they become more effective carriers of pharmaceutical contaminants, particularly in organic matter-rich waters.

Compost Quality and Markets Are Pivotal for Sustainability in Circular Food-Nutrient Systems: A Case Study of Sri Lanka

This study used an interdisciplinary case study approach to assess Sri Lanka's municipal solid waste composting system, finding that compost quality issues including microplastic contamination and market limitations are key barriers to achieving sustainable circular food-nutrient systems.

Weathering induced surface transformation and trace metal affinities of plastic nurdles discharged from the X-Press Pearl ship accident (2021–2024)

Researchers tracked the physical and chemical weathering of plastic nurdles spilled from the X-Press Pearl shipwreck across four sampling time points (16–40 months post-spill) on a Sri Lankan beach. Over time, nurdles showed progressive volume loss, surface oxidation, and increased affinity for trace metals, indicating growing pollution risk with age.

Microplastic abundance, characteristics, and heavy metal contamination in coastal environments of Western Sri Lanka

Adsorptive interaction of antibiotic ciprofloxacin on polyethylene microplastics: Implications for vector transport in water

Contamination and distribution of buried microplastics in Sarakkuwa beach ensuing the MV X-Press Pearl maritime disaster in Sri Lankan sea

Researchers studied microplastic contamination at Sarakkuwa beach in Sri Lanka following the MV X-Press Pearl shipping disaster of May 2021, finding that 2-5 mm partially pyrolyzed LDPE fragments and plastic nurdles had penetrated up to 2 m into beach sediments. The contamination profile differed markedly from baseline samples collected before the disaster, showing persistent deep burial of spilled plastic pellets.

Arsenic interaction with microplastics: Implications for soil-water-food nexus

RETRACTED: Assessing exposure risk to microplastics by Indian Ocean pygmy blue whales

This article has been retracted at the authors' request because it contains data they were not authorized to publish; it should not be cited.

An Assessment of distribution of Airborne Microplastic using Epiphytic Crustose Lichens in Surrounding Areas of an Open Dumpsite of a Plastic Crusher Plant at Kanadola, Sri Lanka

By collecting lichen samples at increasing distances from a plastic crushing plant in Sri Lanka, researchers detected significantly more airborne microplastics near the facility than at a control forest site, with no significant difference between the 50-meter and 50–100-meter zones. The findings demonstrate that industrial plastic processing sites are point sources of airborne microplastic emissions, and that lichens can serve as low-cost passive biomonitors for tracking atmospheric plastic pollution around such facilities.

Interactions and transport of hexavalent chromium with microplastics in detergent-dissolved water

Microplastics and Soil Nutrient Cycling

Microplastics accumulating in agricultural soils can disrupt the natural cycling of carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus by altering microbial communities and reducing soil enzyme activity. This review highlights that even at current environmental concentrations, microplastics may impair the soil ecosystem functions that underpin food production, though the full extent of effects on nutrient cycles remains incompletely understood.

Influence of polyethylene microplastics on thermal properties of water and seawater: A novel detection method for microplastics and nanoplastics

Route of Microplastic Contamination to Agricultural Food

Fate and Behavior of Microplastics in Freshwater Systems

Enhanced vector transport of microplastics-bound lead ions in organic matter rich water

Researchers evaluated how pristine and aged polyethylene microplastics adsorb Pb2+ ions in water under varying pH, ionic strength, contact time, Pb2+ concentration, and humic acid (HA) concentration, finding that HA enhanced lead adsorption onto aged microplastics and that maximum adsorption occurred around pH 5-6, demonstrating the vector transport potential of microplastics for lead in organic matter-rich waters.

Vector transport of microplastics bound potentially toxic elements (PTEs) in water systems

This study examines the vector transport of microplastics carrying potentially toxic elements (PTEs) through water systems, investigating how microplastics serve as carriers that mobilise and redistribute heavy metals and other contaminants across aquatic environments.