Impacto da presença de microplásticos na biodisponibilidade de nutrientes do feijão (Phaseolus vulgaris)

Abstract

Microplastics are an increasingly common problem for human health today, with studies already indicating their presence in a wide range of environments, such as water bodies, crops, and even the human body. This problem raises the need to study these materials, as well as their interactions with other components of the environment in which they are found. With this in mind, this study aims to investigate how the presence of microplastics in beans can alter the availability of nutrients in the food for those who consume them, as well as to analyze the influence of changes in the chemical structure of microplastics on their interaction with nutrients. Several adsorption experiments were conducted using polyethylene (PE) as an adsorbent, both the natural microplastic and the microplastic aged by ultraviolet radiation. In the experiments, parameters were varied, such as the pH of the medium, which is different for each phase of food digestion. Adsorption kinetics experiments were also performed for the different systems, and the measured concentration values were used to calculate the adsorption capacity of each microplastic for each type of nutrient present in the samples. Inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry was used to determine sample concentrations.