TY - JOUR
T1 - Distribution and potential sources of microplastics in sediments in remote lakes of Tibet, China
AU - Liang, Ting
AU - Lei, Zhiyuan
AU - Fuad, Md Tariful Islam
AU - Wang, Qi
AU - Sun, Shichun
AU - Fang, James Kar Hei
AU - Liu, Xiaoshou
N1 - Funding Information:
This study was jointly supported by the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (No. 201964024 ; 201762017 ), the Biodiversity Investigation, Observation and Assessment Program (2019-2023) of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment of China , and the Science and Technology Project of the Tibet Autonomous Region ( XZ201703-GB-04 ). We acknowledge the assistance provided by Prof. Wang Fang, Prof. Long Hongan, Mr. Zhu Boshan and Mr. Wang Pengfei in the field sampling in Tibet, China.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2022/2/1
Y1 - 2022/2/1
N2 - The prevalence of microplastics in water bodies such as oceans and rivers has received considerable attention in recent years. The present study contributes to this research effort by assessing microplastics in 12 remote lakes on the Tibetan Plateau, China. Despite the limited extent of human activities, at least 17 items and up to 2644 items of microplastics were found per kg of dried sediments collected from the lakes in Tibet. These values were considered high compared to the levels of microplastics reported in other lake areas worldwide. Our results showed that the most prevailing types of microplastics in the sediments were black or transparent fibers in the size range of 0.05–0.5 mm, which were mainly identified to be polyamide and polyethylene terephthalate using Fourier-transform infrared microspectroscopy. The number of microplastics found appeared to be higher in sediments with a higher silt and clay content. Atmospheric long-range transport, glacial meltwater and surface runoff represent potential pathways to carry microplastics from elsewhere to the remote lakes in Tibet. This study shall be of great significance in understanding the transport and distribution of microplastics in the environment at regional or global scale.
AB - The prevalence of microplastics in water bodies such as oceans and rivers has received considerable attention in recent years. The present study contributes to this research effort by assessing microplastics in 12 remote lakes on the Tibetan Plateau, China. Despite the limited extent of human activities, at least 17 items and up to 2644 items of microplastics were found per kg of dried sediments collected from the lakes in Tibet. These values were considered high compared to the levels of microplastics reported in other lake areas worldwide. Our results showed that the most prevailing types of microplastics in the sediments were black or transparent fibers in the size range of 0.05–0.5 mm, which were mainly identified to be polyamide and polyethylene terephthalate using Fourier-transform infrared microspectroscopy. The number of microplastics found appeared to be higher in sediments with a higher silt and clay content. Atmospheric long-range transport, glacial meltwater and surface runoff represent potential pathways to carry microplastics from elsewhere to the remote lakes in Tibet. This study shall be of great significance in understanding the transport and distribution of microplastics in the environment at regional or global scale.
KW - FTIR
KW - Long-range transport
KW - Microplastics
KW - Tibetan Plateau
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85115891644&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.150526
DO - 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.150526
M3 - Journal article
C2 - 34597964
AN - SCOPUS:85115891644
SN - 0048-9697
VL - 806
JO - Science of the Total Environment
JF - Science of the Total Environment
M1 - 150526
ER -