Learning from natural sediments to tackle microplastics challenges: A multidisciplinary perspective

• Although the study of microplastics in the aquatic environment incorporates a diversity of research fields, it is still in its infancy in many aspects while comparable topics have been studied in other disciplines for decades. In particular, extensive research in sedimentology can provide valuable insights to guide future microplastics research. To advance our understanding of the comparability of natural sediments with microplastics, we take an interdisciplinary look at the existing literature describing particle properties, transport processes, sampling techniques and ecotoxicology. Based on our analysis, we define seven research goals that are essential to improve our understanding of microplastics and can be tackled by learning from natural sediment research, and identify relevant tasks to achieve each goal. These goals address (1) the description of microplastic particles, (2) the

Subject headings

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Geovetenskap och miljövetenskap -- Geologi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Earth and Related Environmental Sciences -- Geology (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Sediment transport

Ecotoxicology

Comparison

Microparticles

Fate

Distribution

Transport modelling

Rivers

Plastic pollution

Aquatic

pollution

Sediment analogy

Microplastics

turbulence-induced flocculation

particle-size distribution

settling

velocity

transport

vegetation

water

model

shape

flow

load

Geology

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

art (subject category)