Nanoplastics in the Human Body More Effectively Measured Using a New Detecting Method

How do you count the nanoplastics in your body? Leiden researchers published a method in Nature Protocols today that should make this more accessible and more important development for both environmental and medical research.

A Phys.org report specified that according to a professor of Ecotoxicology, Martina Vijver, everything with carbon atoms is "difficult to measure" in organisms, and so is plastic.

She added, that plants and animals themselves largely comprise carbons. Therefore, she asked what exactly was being measured-if it was the plastic or the organism itself.

This new approach developed by Vijver and Willie Peijenburg, in collaboration with a consortium headed by Dr. Fazel Monikh, is lifting a corner of this veil.

Nanoplastics

By enabling nanoplastics first to absorb metal, one can follow them much more effortlessly. As long as they are tracked down again in the right way.

The study published in the Nature Protocols journal describes the different approaches to finding metal nanoplastics again.

Vijver explained, that this enables one to see what occurs in the nanoplastics "after they have been absorbed."

For instance, she continued, which animals pick the nanoplastics up or which organs pick them up. She also asked how much plastic the organism or animal picks up, and all of that can be measured.

Consequently, the paper-primarily describes how the study can be carried out. It is, in fact, quite a "dry paper to read," said Vijver. However, it is essential for researchers that the same protocol can be used. This way, the different outcomes are comparable.

The professor also explained that they find it very logical to know where substances are in the environment. However, there is a need to know where they are in organisms or cells.

It is also the question of if they are stored in fatty portions, for instance, or in the body fluids. With this approach, added Vijver, "we can discover just that."

Moreover, it is not just ecologists who are happy about this new approach. This protocol is very significant as well for the development of drugs. One can easily employ it to discover how well medicines come to the right place in the body.

What are Nanoplastics?

The Nanotechnology Industries Association describes nanoplastics as a "non-specific and ambiguous term," and qualifiers need to be considered for precise presentation to all types of audiences.

Essentially, incidental "nanoplastics," or "incidental plastic nanoscale materials, can be constructed by degradation of plastics or from wear.

Manufactured nanoplastics, for instance, plastic nanomaterials, are deliberately produced at the nanoscale to enable particular product characteristics.

Manufactured "nanoplastics" within the environment are expected to be extremely low as they are incorporated into products, for example, bound in a matrix.

Related information about nanoplastics is shown on WoodwardTV's YouTube video below:

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