Papers

61,005 results
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Article Tier 2

Biodegradable Nanoplastics: An Overlooked Polluting Terra Incognita Towards Global Plastic Risk Assessment?

Researchers reviewed the environmental risks posed by biodegradable nanoplastics, arguing that the shift toward biodegradable plastics has introduced an undermonitored pollutant whose global occurrence, fate, and ecological risk remain poorly understood, and called for coordinated full-chain risk assessment and improved detection frameworks.

2026 Nanomaterials
Article Tier 2

Characterization, occurrence, environmental behaviors, and risks of nanoplastics in the aquatic environment: Current status and future perspectives

This review characterized the occurrence, environmental behavior, and toxicity of nanoplastics in aquatic systems, noting that their small size gives them unique properties — including higher surface reactivity and greater bioavailability — that make them potentially more hazardous than larger microplastics, while also harder to detect.

2021 Fundamental Research 34 citations
Article Tier 2

Nanomaterials in Drug Delivery: Strengths and Opportunities in Medicine

This review covers how nanomaterials are being used to improve drug delivery for treating cancer and infections, offering better targeted therapy with fewer side effects. While not directly about microplastics, the research on how nanoparticles interact with human tissues provides insight into how similarly sized nanoplastics might behave once inside the body.

2024 Molecules 84 citations
Article Tier 2

Plastic Pollution. The Role of (Bio)Degradable Plastics and Other Solutions

This review examines the scope of plastic pollution including micro and nanoplastics (MNPs), their environmental and health impacts, and potential mitigation strategies including biodegradable plastics and design-for-end-of-life approaches. The authors evaluate the conditions under which biodegradable plastics can and cannot serve as viable solutions to plastic pollution.

2022 18 citations
Article Tier 2

A malleable catalyst dominates the metabolism of drugs

Researchers investigated micro- and nano-plastics as emerging global pollutants, noting a critical knowledge gap in nanoplastics research due to insufficient analytical methods, and highlighting that nanoplastics pose greater toxicity concerns than microplastics because of their ability to penetrate biological systems more readily.

2006 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 55 citations
Article Tier 2

Microplastics and Nanoplastics in the Environment: Sources, Toxicity, and Ecological Implications

This review covered the sources, environmental fate, toxicological effects, and ecological risks of microplastics and nanoplastics across all environmental compartments. The authors emphasized the bioaccumulation potential, persistence, and toxic effects of MNPs and called for coordinated international efforts to address this global contamination challenge.

2025 Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)
Article Tier 2

Challenges and opportunities in bioremediation of micro-nano plastics: A review.

This review examines biological approaches to removing micro- and nanoplastics from the environment, focusing on microbial degradation and bioremediation strategies. While bioremediation holds promise, challenges remain in identifying microbes capable of degrading common plastic types and scaling these processes for practical environmental cleanup.

2022 The Science of the total environment
Article Tier 2

Nanoplastics in the Environment: Sources, Fate, Toxicity, Challenges and Mitigation Strategies

This review covers the formation, environmental fate, and health risks of nanoplastics, emphasizing their capacity to penetrate biological barriers and cause oxidative stress, inflammation, DNA damage, and endocrine disruption, alongside current strategies for mitigation.

2025 Asian Journal of Environment & Ecology
Systematic Review Tier 1

Micro(nano)plastics as a vector of pharmaceuticals in aquatic ecosystem: Historical review and future trends

This systematic review examines how microplastics and nanoplastics in water can absorb and carry pharmaceutical drugs, creating a combined pollution threat. When medications attach to tiny plastic particles in rivers and oceans, they may become more harmful to aquatic life and potentially to humans who consume contaminated seafood or water. The research traces how this emerging double-threat has grown since 2018 and identifies key knowledge gaps.

2022 Journal of Hazardous Materials Advances 32 citations
Article Tier 2

Innovative Approaches to Microplastic and Nano-plastic Biodegradation

This review covers innovative biotechnological approaches to microplastic and nanoplastic biodegradation, examining the origins of these particles from larger plastic waste and intentionally manufactured microbeads. The authors assess promising biological and enzymatic strategies for accelerating breakdown of persistent plastic polymers in environmental and engineered systems.

2024 Egyptian Journal of Botany
Article Tier 2

The Other Side of Plastics: Bioplastic-Based Nanoparticles for Drug Delivery Systems in the Brain

This review explores bioplastic-based nanoparticles as potential drug delivery vehicles for brain diseases, examining both their therapeutic promise and safety concerns. Researchers found that biodegradable polymers can pass through biological barriers and concentrate in specific tissues, making them useful for targeted drug delivery. However, the study cautions that the same properties enabling tissue penetration also raise concerns about long-term accumulation and unknown biological effects.

2023 Pharmaceutics 14 citations
Article Tier 2

Environmental Fate, Behavior, and Risk Management Approaches of Nanoplastics in the Environment

Researchers reviewed the environmental fate, behavior, and risk management of nanoplastics, which are plastic particles smaller than one micrometer. The study suggests that nanoplastics may pose greater environmental and health risks than larger microplastics due to their nanoscale properties, though significant knowledge gaps remain about their transport, transformation, and long-term ecological effects.

2024 2 citations
Article Tier 2

Novel Acumens into Biodegradation: Impact of Nanomaterials and Their Contribution

This review examines how nanomaterials can enhance the biodegradation of pollutants, including plastics, in the environment. Nanomaterial-assisted biodegradation offers a potential strategy for accelerating the breakdown of plastic waste before it fragments into microplastics.

2021 IntechOpen eBooks 4 citations
Article Tier 2

Advances in Drug Targeting, Drug Delivery, and Nanotechnology Applications: Therapeutic Significance in Cancer Treatment

This review covers advances in targeted drug delivery using nanotechnology, including nanoparticles and liposomes designed to release medications precisely where needed in the body. While focused on cancer treatment, the drug delivery technologies discussed are relevant to understanding how nanoscale plastic particles may also travel through the body and accumulate in specific tissues.

2025 Pharmaceutics 36 citations
Article Tier 2

Solution or Pollution? A paradigm shifts in understanding the fate and threats of biodegradable plastics in the marine environment

This review challenges the assumption that biodegradable plastics are inherently eco-friendly by examining their degradation behavior in marine environments. Researchers found that biodegradable plastics often require specific conditions to break down and can themselves become sources of microplastic pollution when those conditions are not met. The study highlights a significant research gap in understanding the fate of biodegradable nano- and pico-plastics in marine ecosystems.

2025 Journal of Hazardous Materials Advances 1 citations
Article Tier 2

Nanoplastic paradox: unraveling the complex toxicity of nano-sized polyethylene

This review examined the paradoxical toxicity of nano-sized polyethylene particles, documenting that nanoplastic toxicity is not straightforward and depends on size, surface chemistry, concentration, and biological context—with much uncertainty remaining about how environmental polyethylene nanoplastics impact living organisms.

2025 Environmental Science Nano
Article Tier 2

Nanoplastics as a Vehicle for Environmental Pollutants: A Hazard for Human Health

This review examines nanoplastics as environmental vectors for chemical pollutants, discussing how their high surface-area-to-volume ratio enables adsorption of heavy metals, pesticides, and persistent organic pollutants. The authors assess the evidence for nanoplastic-facilitated delivery of these co-contaminants to human tissues and call for dedicated nanoplastic toxicology studies.

2024
Article Tier 2

Research progress of nanoplastics in freshwater

This review summarized the environmental fate, extraction methods, characterization techniques, and biological effects of nanoplastics in freshwater systems, noting that NPs' small size, high surface area, and cell-penetrating ability make them potentially more harmful than microplastics despite being less studied.

2020 The Science of The Total Environment 99 citations
Article Tier 2

Evaluation of the degradation from micro to nanoplastics from biodegradable bags in marine conditions

Researchers evaluated how biodegradable plastic bags degrade into micro- and nanoplastics under environmental conditions, comparing them to conventional plastics. The study found that even biodegradable materials generate persistent micro- and nanoplastic particles under real-world conditions.

2024 Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)
Article Tier 2

Application of Nanomaterials in the Degradation of Micro and Nano Plastics

This review examined the application of nanomaterials for degrading micro- and nanoplastics, covering photocatalytic, oxidative, and biological nanomaterial approaches and evaluating their efficiency and scalability for plastic pollution remediation.

2024 BENTHAM SCIENCE PUBLISHERS eBooks
Article Tier 2

Nanoscale plastic pollution: sources, identification and potential mitigation

This review examines the sources, environmental fate, and potential mitigation strategies for nanoscale plastic pollution, tracing the accumulation of plastic particles from millimetre to nanometre scales over decades. It highlights key knowledge gaps and emerging approaches for reducing nanoplastic contamination in ecosystems.

2025 Nanotechnology
Article Tier 2

Environmental Toxicity of Emerging Micro and Nanoplastics

This review examines the environmental toxicity of emerging micro- and nanoplastics, covering their sources, degradation pathways, ecological impacts on organisms, and the need for standardized risk assessment frameworks.

2022 24 citations
Article Tier 2

A review on occurrence, characteristics, toxicology and treatment of nanoplastic waste in the environment

This review summarizes the current understanding of nanoplastic pollution, including sources, occurrence in water, soil, and air, and potential toxicity to aquatic and terrestrial organisms. The study highlights major gaps in analytical methods for detecting nanoplastics and calls for more research on their environmental fate and health effects.

2021 Environmental Science and Pollution Research 56 citations
Article Tier 2

The Environmental Impacts of Nanoplastics in Marine Ecosystems

This review examined how nanoplastics—generated by degradation of larger plastics—penetrate biological barriers, accumulate in tissues, contribute to biomagnification, and disrupt marine food chains, highlighting their distinct ecotoxicological mechanisms compared to larger microplastics.

2025