A rapid-screening approach to detect and quantify microplastics based on fluorescent tagging with Nile Red
By T. Maes, R. Jessop, N. Wellner, K. Haupt, A. Mayes. Scientific Reports, 2017
802 citations recorded by the source corpus.
A new approach is presented for analysis of microplastics in environmental samples, based on selective fluorescent staining using Nile Red (NR), followed by density-based extraction and filtration. The dye adsorbs onto plastic surfaces and renders them fluorescent when irradiated with blue light. Fluorescence emission is detected using simple photography through an orange filter. Image-analysis allows fluorescent particles to be identified and counted. Magnified images can be recorded and tiled to cover the whole filter area, allowing particles down to a few micrometres to be detected. The solvatochromic nature of Nile Red also offers the possibility of plastic categorisation based on surface polarity characteristics of identified particles. This article details the development of this staining method and its initial cross-validation by comparison with infrared (IR) microscopy. Microplastics of different sizes could be detected and counted in marine sediment samples. The fluorescence staining identified the same particles as those found by scanning a filter area with IR-microscopy.
Subfields: Biomedical Engineering, Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering, Pollution
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/87c9218ea7307f6016b03ab3483f2d332d64c168
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Citations in the corpus
- Reporting Guidelines to Increase the Reproducibility and Comparability of Research on Microplastics (2020, neutral): “…Fluorescence microscopy Magnification used during identification 90 Fluorescence light wavelength, intensity, and exposure time to light source 90,91,107 Threshold intensity used to identify plastic 107 Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) The coating used (e.g., metal type, water vapor) 108…”
- Recommended best practices for plastic and litter ingestion studies in marine birds: Collection, processing, and reporting (2019, methodology): “This approach uses the selective staining properties of Nile Red onto plastics surfaces, which then makes plastic pieces fluoresce under blue light (Maes et al. 2017).”
- Synthetic Polymer Contamination in Bottled Water (2018, methodology): “While under the fume hood, each bottle was opened and injected with a specific volume of Nile Red solution (prepared in acetone to 1mg mL−1) to yield a working concentration of 10 ug mL−1 (Maes et al., 2017) and re-capped.”
- Atmospheric microplastic deposition in an urban environment and an evaluation of transport (2019, background): “Nile Red (NR) is a lipophilic dye which has been used to stain microplastics to facilitate their identification and analysis in samples (Maes et al., 2017).”
- Low levels of microplastics (MP) in wild mussels indicate that MP ingestion by humans is minimal compared to exposure via household fibres fallout during a meal. (2018, methodology): “This methodology has been validated and has a similar accuracy to FT-IR and Raman Spectroscopy (Erni-Cassola et al., 2017; Maes et al., 2017; Shim et al., 2016).”
- A Global Perspective on Microplastics (2020, background): “Fluorescence may also be used to prescreen targets for further micro FTIR or Raman investigation (e.g., Maes et al., 2017).”
- Contributions of Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy in microplastic pollution research: A review (2020, methodology): “In general, two approaches are followed to analyze MPs on filter materi- als: (1) measurement of complete filter area spot by spot (Kappler et al., 2016; Loder et al., 2015; Primpke et al., 2017) and (2) measurement of selected points of interest (Maes et al., 2017).”
- Microplastics Effects on Reproduction and Body Length of the Soil-Dwelling Nematode Caenorhabditis elegans (2020, methodology): “…with the fluorescent dye NR Frontiers in Environmental Science | www.frontiersin.org 3 April 2020 | Volume 8 | Article 41 (72485, Sigma-Aldrich, St. Louis, MO, United States) that was recently used for the detection of MP in environmental samples (e.g., Shim et al., 2016; Maes et al., 2017).”