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Microfibers in oceanic surface waters: A global characterization

Microfibers are ubiquitous contaminants of emerging concern. Traditionally ascribed to the “microplastics” family, their widespread occurrence in the natural environment is commonly reported in plastic pollution studies, based on the assumption that fibers largely derive from wear and tear of synthe...

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Autores principales: Suaria, Giuseppe, Achtypi, Aikaterini, Perold, Vonica, Lee, Jasmine R., Pierucci, Andrea, Bornman, Thomas G., Aliani, Stefano, Ryan, Peter G.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: American Association for the Advancement of Science 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7274779/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32548254
http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aay8493
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author Suaria, Giuseppe
Achtypi, Aikaterini
Perold, Vonica
Lee, Jasmine R.
Pierucci, Andrea
Bornman, Thomas G.
Aliani, Stefano
Ryan, Peter G.
author_facet Suaria, Giuseppe
Achtypi, Aikaterini
Perold, Vonica
Lee, Jasmine R.
Pierucci, Andrea
Bornman, Thomas G.
Aliani, Stefano
Ryan, Peter G.
author_sort Suaria, Giuseppe
collection PubMed
description Microfibers are ubiquitous contaminants of emerging concern. Traditionally ascribed to the “microplastics” family, their widespread occurrence in the natural environment is commonly reported in plastic pollution studies, based on the assumption that fibers largely derive from wear and tear of synthetic textiles. By compiling a global dataset from 916 seawater samples collected in six ocean basins, we show that although synthetic polymers currently account for two-thirds of global fiber production, oceanic fibers are mainly composed of natural polymers. µFT-IR characterization of ~2000 fibers revealed that only 8.2% of oceanic fibers are synthetic, with most being cellulosic (79.5%) or of animal origin (12.3%). The widespread occurrence of natural fibers throughout marine environments emphasizes the necessity of chemically identifying microfibers before classifying them as microplastics. Our results highlight a considerable mismatch between the global production of synthetic fibers and the current composition of marine fibers, a finding that clearly deserves further attention.
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spelling pubmed-72747792020-06-15 Microfibers in oceanic surface waters: A global characterization Suaria, Giuseppe Achtypi, Aikaterini Perold, Vonica Lee, Jasmine R. Pierucci, Andrea Bornman, Thomas G. Aliani, Stefano Ryan, Peter G. Sci Adv Research Articles Microfibers are ubiquitous contaminants of emerging concern. Traditionally ascribed to the “microplastics” family, their widespread occurrence in the natural environment is commonly reported in plastic pollution studies, based on the assumption that fibers largely derive from wear and tear of synthetic textiles. By compiling a global dataset from 916 seawater samples collected in six ocean basins, we show that although synthetic polymers currently account for two-thirds of global fiber production, oceanic fibers are mainly composed of natural polymers. µFT-IR characterization of ~2000 fibers revealed that only 8.2% of oceanic fibers are synthetic, with most being cellulosic (79.5%) or of animal origin (12.3%). The widespread occurrence of natural fibers throughout marine environments emphasizes the necessity of chemically identifying microfibers before classifying them as microplastics. Our results highlight a considerable mismatch between the global production of synthetic fibers and the current composition of marine fibers, a finding that clearly deserves further attention. American Association for the Advancement of Science 2020-06-05 /pmc/articles/PMC7274779/ /pubmed/32548254 http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aay8493 Text en Copyright © 2020 The Authors, some rights reserved; exclusive licensee American Association for the Advancement of Science. No claim to original U.S. Government Works. Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial License 4.0 (CC BY-NC). http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) , which permits use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, so long as the resultant use is not for commercial advantage and provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research Articles
Suaria, Giuseppe
Achtypi, Aikaterini
Perold, Vonica
Lee, Jasmine R.
Pierucci, Andrea
Bornman, Thomas G.
Aliani, Stefano
Ryan, Peter G.
Microfibers in oceanic surface waters: A global characterization
title Microfibers in oceanic surface waters: A global characterization
title_full Microfibers in oceanic surface waters: A global characterization
title_fullStr Microfibers in oceanic surface waters: A global characterization
title_full_unstemmed Microfibers in oceanic surface waters: A global characterization
title_short Microfibers in oceanic surface waters: A global characterization
title_sort microfibers in oceanic surface waters: a global characterization
topic Research Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7274779/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32548254
http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aay8493
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