Plastic pollution remains one of the world’s most challenging environmental problems. Plastic pollution has been found everywhere on Earth, from the highest mountain peaks to the deepest parts of the ocean. And scientists are finding that plastic is also moving through the air we breathe.
Over the past two decades, researchers have detected microplastics and even smaller nanoplastics throughout Earth’s systems, including water, soil, living organisms, and increasingly, the atmosphere. But measuring just how much plastic is airborne has remained a major challenge.
To solve this problem, researchers at the Chinese Academy of Sciences developed a new semi-automated technique to track plastic particles in the air. Their system relies on computer-controlled scanning electron microscopy to identify plastics more accurately and with less human bias.
The team tested the method in two major Chinese cities, analyzing airborne particles, falling dust, rain, snow, and resuspended road dust. What they found was startling.
Plastic concentrations in the urban air were two to six times greater than previous estimates. These findings suggest that earlier studies may have significantly underestimated how much plastic is present in the air.
The study, which was recently published in the journal Science Advances, offers the clearest picture yet of plastics in the atmosphere, which is the least understood part of the global plastic cycle.
Understanding how these particles move, clump together, and fall back to Earth may help reveal their impacts on climate, ecosystems, and human health.
