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Interaction of plastic particles with heavy metals and the resulting toxicological impacts: a review

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Abstract

Interactions of plastic particles with different organic/inorganic pollutants including heavy metals impact their ecotoxicological potential, and proper understanding in this regard is important for their ecological risk assessment. However, many studies have reported the interactions between micro-/nanoplastics (MNPs) and heavy metals (HMs), but the most prevalent interactive forces and factors monitoring their interactions are still not clear. So, the present review represents the mechanisms of interactions with special emphasis on major interactive forces and biophysicochemical and environmental factors influencing trace element’s adsorption onto the surface of MNPs. Electrostatic interaction and pore-filling mechanism can best explain the HMs adsorption to MNPs. A number of biophysicochemical factors (such as biofilm, size, crystallinity, and surface charge) and environmental factors (such as pH, salt, and temperature) act together for mediating interactions and ecotoxicities of MNPs and HMs in the real environment. From a toxicological point of view, the synergistic mode of action may be more active in animals, whereas the antagonistic activity may be prevalent in plants. Besides polymer density, biofilm formation and agglomeration property of MNPs can control the vertical distribution of MNPs along the water column. Finally, the ecotoxicological potential of MNPs in the natural environment can be considered as a function of spatiotemporal variation in abiotic (including MNPs and heavy metals) and biotic components. This review will be helpful in the detail understanding of ecotoxicological risk assessment of MNPs in relation to their interaction with heavy metals.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to acknowledge the CSIR-JRF grant to the first author (file no. 08/155(0075)/2019-EMR-I) and FRPDF scheme, Presidency University, Kolkata, India. The authors are also grateful to DST-SERB, Govt. of India, for funding the research project (EEQ/2018/000275) to the corresponding author. We are thankful to DBT-BUILDER and DST-FIST, Govt. of India, for sponsoring infrastructural facility to DLS (SR/FST/LSI-560/2013(C)).

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Author notes

  1. Chayan Biswas, Sambuddha Banerjee and Rajkumar Guchhait contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Integrative Biology Research Unit (IBRU), Department of Life Sciences, Presidency University, 86/1 College Street, Kolkata, West Bengal, 700073, India

    Sukhendu Maity, Chayan Biswas, Sambuddha Banerjee, Madhuchhanda Adhikari, Ankit Chatterjee & Kousik Pramanick

  2. Mahishadal Raj College, Garkamalpur, Purba Medinipur, West Bengal, 721628, India

    Rajkumar Guchhait

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  1. Sukhendu Maity
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  2. Chayan Biswas
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  3. Sambuddha Banerjee
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  4. Rajkumar Guchhait
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  5. Madhuchhanda Adhikari
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  7. Kousik Pramanick
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Contributions

Sukhendu Maity: Conceptualization-lead, data curation-lead, formal analysis-lead, funding acquisition-equal, writing-original draft-lead. Rajkumar Guchhait: data curation-supporting, formal analysis-supporting, writing-original draft-supporting. Chayan Biswas: data curation-supporting, formal analysis-supporting, writing-original draft-supporting. Sambuddha Banerjee: data curation-supporting, formal analysis-supporting, writing-original draft-supporting. Madhuchhanda Adhikari: data curation-supporting, formal analysis-supporting.Ankit Chatterjee: data curation-supporting, formal analysis-supporting.Kousik Pramanick: conceptualization-lead, funding acquisition-equal, validation-lead, writing-review and editing-equal.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Kousik Pramanick.

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Maity, ., Biswas, C., Banerjee, S. et al. Interaction of plastic particles with heavy metals and the resulting toxicological impacts: a review. Environ Sci Pollut Res 28, 60291–60307 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-16448-z

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