Approaches For Identifying And Characterizing Microplastics In Biosolids Using Density Separation And µFTIR Spectroscopy

Author

Nicole L. Velasquez Polania, CUNY City CollegeFollow

Date of Award

2025

Document Type

Thesis

Department

Earth and Atmospheric Sciences

First Advisor

Brian Giebel

Second Advisor

Pengfei Zhang

Third Advisor

Steven Kidder

Keywords

MICROPLASTICS, BIOSOLIDS, WASTEWATER TREATMENT PLANT (WWTP), FTIR, POLYMERS

Abstract

Wastewater biosolids are a direct source of microplastics to the terrestrial environment because they are often applied in agricultural settings to increase field and soil nutrients. At present, the research community is struggling to standardized analytical methods for addressing this emerging environmental concern. This research aims to address this lack of standardization by developing a protocol to extract, count, and identify the types of microplastics in biosolids collected from two wastewater treatment locations in a large urban city. Our approach utilizes a density separation and a Fenton digestion as main components to collect microplastics and to allow their analysis with µFTIR spectroscopy. Data analysis was achieved using an iterative comparison and cross-validation of two separate spectral libraries – a commercial library available with the instrumentation and Open Specy, an online and open-source library used more frequently in support of microplastic research

Recommended Citation

Velasquez Polania, Nicole L., "Approaches For Identifying And Characterizing Microplastics In Biosolids Using Density Separation And µFTIR Spectroscopy" (2025). CUNY Academic Works.
https://academicworks.cuny.edu/cc_etds_theses/1197