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61,005 resultsShowing papers similar to Review of microplastics in museum specimens: An under-utilized tool to better understand the Plasticene
ClearCan natural history collection specimens be used as aquatic microplastic pollution bioindicators?
Researchers explored whether preserved animal specimens from natural history museum collections could serve as historical records of microplastic pollution over time. By reviewing how such collections have been used to track other pollutants, they identified key challenges — including inconsistent sampling and specimen degradation — and proposed guidelines for using museum archives to reconstruct how microplastic contamination has changed over decades.
Microplastics in Museums: Pollution and Paleoecology
This study investigated microplastic contamination in museum natural history collections, assessing both the pollution risk to preserved specimens and the potential for using archived samples to study historical microplastic accumulation in ecosystems.
The role of museum of biological collections in environmental research: a short note
Museum biological collections — preserved specimens gathered over decades — provide a unique way to track how chemical contaminants like microplastics and heavy metals have changed in ecosystems over time. Comparing historical and modern specimens allows researchers to identify long-term pollution trends that would be impossible to detect through contemporary sampling alone.
Surrounded by microplastic, since when? Testing the feasibility of exploring past levels of plastic microfibre pollution using natural history museum collections
Microplastic fibers were found in over half of marine sponge specimens collected more than 20 years ago and preserved in a museum collection. This retrospective finding confirms that microplastic fiber pollution in the ocean predates recent awareness, providing a historical baseline for tracking contamination over time.
Optimisation of enzymatic digestion and validation of specimen preservation methods for the analysis of ingested microplastics
This study developed and validated an enzymatic tissue digestion method for extracting microplastics from both freshly collected and museum-archived marine specimens. The non-destructive approach opens the possibility of using long-term museum collections to trace historical changes in microplastic ingestion by marine organisms.
Measuring historical pollution: natural history collections as tools for public health and environmental justice research
This review argues that biological specimens held in natural history museum collections — such as preserved birds, fish, and insects — represent an underutilized archive of quantitative pollution data spanning nearly two centuries. By linking historical specimen data to health outcomes in affected communities, researchers could better understand the long-term consequences of emerging contaminants like microplastics and support environmental justice policy.
A fish tale: a century of museum specimens reveal increasing microplastic concentrations in freshwater fish
Researchers analyzed preserved museum fish specimens spanning over a century (1900-2017) and found that microplastic concentrations in freshwater fish digestive tissues have increased significantly over time, correlating with rising global plastic production. The increase was most pronounced after the 1950s when plastic manufacturing expanded dramatically. The study provides the first historical timeline of microplastic ingestion in freshwater fish, confirming that contamination has escalated alongside industrial plastic use.
Microplastic abundance in the Eastern Tropical Pacific 2008-2018
Researchers re-analyzed archived zooplankton samples collected at four Eastern Tropical Pacific stations between 2008 and 2018 to quantify microplastic abundance, providing a decade-long temporal record of plastic contamination in this oceanic region.
Occurrence, Distribution, and Extraction Methods of Microplastics in Marine Organisms
This review synthesizes global data on microplastic occurrence and distribution across marine organisms, comparing the advantages and limitations of different extraction and identification methods used in the field.
Monitoring the evolution of deep-sea microplastic pollution in the Indo-Pacific using natural history collection holothurian specimens
Researchers used preserved holothurian (sea cucumber) specimens from natural history collections spanning decades to monitor the temporal evolution of deep-sea microplastic pollution in the Indo-Pacific, providing a rare historical record of how microplastic ingestion by benthic organisms has changed since plastic production began in the 1950s.
The Paleoecology of Microplastic Contamination
This paper reviews how paleoecological methods — using naturally accumulating environmental archives like sediment cores — can be applied to reconstruct the historical timeline of microplastic contamination. Long-term records are needed to establish baselines and understand how rapidly microplastic pollution has escalated over the past century.
Establishing a baseline for microplastic accumulation in deep-sea animals using an historical sample archive
This crowdfunded research project aims to establish baseline data on microplastic accumulation in deep-sea animals using historical sample archives. Comparing old and new specimens over time could reveal how plastic pollution in the deep ocean has changed over decades.
Tracking the microplastic accumulation from past to present in the freshwater ecosystems: A case study in Susurluk Basin, Turkey
Researchers tracked the historical accumulation of microplastics in freshwater lake sediment cores, finding a steady increase in particle deposition corresponding to rising plastic production since the mid-20th century and demonstrating that sediment archives can reconstruct the timeline of freshwater microplastic pollution.
The fate of microplastic in marine sedimentary environments: A review and synthesis
A systematic review of 80 papers on microplastics in marine sediments found median concentrations varied widely by sediment environment, with fibers dominating many locations, and showed that sediment grain size and organic carbon content influence microplastic accumulation.
La pollution microplastique des grands fonds marins de l'Indo-Pacifique : mobilisation des collections d'holothuries du Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle pour une analyse rétrospective
Researchers investigated the use of museum collections of deep-sea holothuroids (sea cucumbers) gathered over 50 years of Indo-Pacific oceanographic surveys as proxies to retrospectively assess the temporal dynamics of benthic microplastic pollution in otherwise inaccessible deep-sea environments.
Can a Sediment Core Reveal the Plastic Age? Microplastic Preservation in a Coastal Sedimentary Record
Researchers used a sediment core from the NW Mediterranean Sea combined with state-of-the-art microplastic identification methods to reconstruct the historical record of microplastic pollution down to 11 micrometers in size. The core revealed a clear acceleration in microplastic burial rates since the 1960s and provided evidence that some polymer types are preserved well in sediment.
A review of the use of microplastics in reconstructing dated sedimentary archives
This critical review examined the use of buried microplastics as stratigraphic markers in dated sediment cores, finding variable data quality and methodological inconsistencies across studies, and recommending standardized protocols to improve reliability of microplastic-based sediment chronologies.
Lanternfish as bioindicator of microplastics in the deep sea: A spatiotemporal analysis using museum specimens
Researchers analyzed lanternfish specimens collected across space and time from the deep sea to assess their utility as bioindicators of microplastic pollution, examining spatiotemporal patterns in microplastic occurrence and abundance in these mesopelagic fish.
Museum-archived myctophids reveal decadal trends in microplastic and microfiber ingestion
Researchers measured microplastic and microfiber ingestion in museum-archived deep-sea fish (myctophids) collected from 1962 to 2016 to determine whether contamination has increased in parallel with rising plastic production. Fish near the U.S. west coast showed a significant trend toward increasing microplastic ingestion over the 54-year period, though no significant trend was found across the broader North Pacific dataset.
Sponges as libraries: Increase in microplastics in Cinachyrella alloclada after 36 years
Researchers compared microplastic concentrations in the tropical sponge Cinachyrella alloclada using museum specimens from 1981 versus field-collected specimens from 2017, finding a tenfold increase from 0.13 to 1.37 microplastics per gram of tissue and an increase in prevalence from 10% to 80% of individuals, with Raman spectroscopy identifying polypropylene fibers as the dominant polymer type.
Temporal distribution of microplastics and other anthropogenic particles in four marine species from the Atlantic coast (France)
Researchers examined how microplastic and other anthropogenic particle abundances in lake sediments have changed over time using sediment cores, linking increases to historical industrialization and urbanization. The temporal record provides context for understanding how plastic pollution has accelerated in recent decades.
Lanternfish as bioindicator of microplastics in the deep sea: A spatiotemporal analysis using museum specimens
Using archived museum specimens of lanternfish collected from 1999 to 2017, researchers tracked microplastic ingestion trends in one of the world's most abundant deep-sea vertebrates. They found that 55% of 1,167 specimens contained microplastics, with ingestion probability increasing over time, and that migration patterns were the strongest predictor of contamination levels.
Benthic foraminifera in Gulf of Mexico show temporal and spatial dynamics of microplastics
Researchers used benthic foraminifera from sediment cores in the Gulf of Mexico to reconstruct the temporal and spatial dynamics of microplastic accumulation since plastic production began. The study found that microplastic concentrations in sediment records reflected the historical increase in global plastic production over recent decades.
Enzymatic digestion method development for long-term stored chitinaceous planktonic samples
Researchers developed an enzymatic digestion method for extracting microplastics from long-term preserved chitinaceous planktonic crustacean samples, comparing material from 1985 and 2020 North Sea collections. The method enables retrospective microplastic analysis in archived time-series biological collections, providing a tool for investigating historical changes in marine microplastic exposure.