Microbeads From Personal Care Products Facilitate Transfer of Adsorbed Pollutants to Fish

The contamination of the natural environment with plastic debris is an increasingly high-prioritised concern among regulators, scientists and citizens. Aside from negative impacts on natural aesthetics, plastic debris causes a... [ view full abstract ]

The contamination of the natural environment with plastic debris is an increasingly high-prioritised concern among regulators, scientists and citizens. Aside from negative impacts on natural aesthetics, plastic debris causes a range of ecological harm from entanglement to starvation when mistakenly ingested by animals Plastic adsorbs and concentrates pollution from the surrounding environment but the role that plastic debris plays in the movement of chemical pollution and contamination of food chains is largely unknown. Recent studies show that plastics facilitate the bioaccumulation of pollution to a variety of exposed organisms. Here we show for the first time that fish fed small microplastic particles (s-MPPS), isolated from a commercial facial cleanser and contaminated with the persistent organic pollutants polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs), bioaccumulated PBDEs in their tissues.