Sept. 28, 2023, 9:28 p.m.

WASHINGTON: Japanese researchers have confirmed that microplastics are present in clouds and may be influencing the climate in ways that are not yet fully understood. according to NDTV, In the study published in Environmental Chemistry Letters, scientists climbed Mt. Fuji and Mt. Daisen, collected water from the fog that covered the mountain peaks, and used advanced imaging techniques on the samples to determine its physical and chemical properties. I researched the characteristics.

Microplastics Are Present In Clouds

The research team identified nine types of polymers and one type of rubber in airborne microplastics, ranging in size from 7.1 to 94.6 micrometers. Each liter of cloudy water contained between 6.7 and 13.9 plastic parts.

In addition, the abundance of "hydrophilic" or water-loving polymers suggests that these particles play an important role in rapid cloud formation and thus in the climate system.

"If we do not proactively address the problem of 'plastic air pollution,' climate change and ecological risks will become a reality, potentially causing serious and irreversible environmental damage in the future," said the lead author. Hiroshi Okochi of Waseda University warned in a statement. Wednesday.

When microplastics reach the upper atmosphere and are exposed to ultraviolet light from sunlight, they break down and contribute to the production of greenhouse gases, Okochi added.

Microplastics – defined as plastic particles smaller than 5 millimeters – come from industrial wastewater, textiles, synthetic automobile tires, personal care products, and more.

These small fragments were found in the bodies of fish in the deepest parts of the ocean, scattered across the sea ice of the Arctic and capped by the snow of the Pyrenees mountains between France and Spain.

However, the transport mechanism of microplastics remains unclear, and research on the pneumatic transport of microplastics is particularly limited.

"To our knowledge, this is the first report on suspended microplastics in cloud water," the authors write in their paper.

New evidence suggests that microplastics have a range of impacts on heart and lung health and cancer, in addition to widespread environmental damage.

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