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Wastewater-derived chemicals entering riverine and coastal waters contribute to airborne pollutants within coastal aerosols.

A new study from UC San Diego examines how pollutants from the Tijuana River travel and are transmitted in the atmosphere through coastal aerosols. The study found a mixture of drugs and chemicals fro...

Wastewater-derived chemicals entering riverine and coastal waters contribute to airborne pollutants within coastal aerosols.

Micro- and nanoplastic particles (MNPPs) are emerging pollutants with significant environmental impacts due to their persistence, increasing concentrations, and potential health risks. Most MNPP studies have focused on identifying, quantifying, and assessing their ecotoxicological impacts in water or soil. However, the atmosphere is crucial in transporting and chemically transforming MNPPs. Further, well-established aerosol particle characterization techniques are underutilized and inconsistently applied in existing atmospheric MNPP studies. This perspective synthesizes the existing literature and addresses future research needs unique to atmospheric MNPPs, highlighting the need to bridge the microplastics and atmospheric aerosol communities to better understand their sources, chemical transformations, transport mechanisms, as well as their health effects and ecological impacts, which differ from those in soil and water. Advancing research in these areas requires standardized methods and a multidisciplinary approach to comprehensively assess MNPP interactions across environmental compartments, providing essential insights into their environmental fate and risks.