Microplastics are possibly the greatest hazard to the environment since the ozone layer depletion and global warming.
Unfortunately for life on Earth, microplastics are now spread across the entire planet.
The race is on to identify the nature, cause, and effects of these materials, and to find suitable remedies for environmental clean-up.
Scientists are now studying details of the global distribution of microplastics. Plastics are easily ground down into micro particles by environmental action, such as oceanic movement.
As a result, microplastics are not just found in the environment, but also the entire food chain.
There are many analytical techniques being used, but one of the most important is molecular spectroscopy, and in particular, the vibrational measurements offered by Raman and IR.
This makes microscopy an extremely important tool, not only in the identification of chemical composition, but also the shape and size distribution.
When IR and Raman Microscopy are used, the physical nature of the particles can be observed together with the distribution and chemical composition.
This eBook introduces the various molecular spectroscopy technique for microplastic analysis.
