News

New publication in the journal 'Microplastics' on 'COST Action PRIORITY: An EU Perspective on Micro- and Nanoplastics as Global Issues'.
Join the 1st workshop on PRIORITY Short Term Scientific Missions to be held on November 15, 2022 from 10:00 am to 1:00 pm (CET).
Save the date for the Microplastics Early Career Workshop in Athens, Greece, June 14-17, sponsored by COST Action PRIORITY. More information to follow soon!
COST Action PRIORITY has been launched! PIORITY is a transdisciplinary research network focused on strategies to tackle the global challenge of micro- and nanoplastics in the environment. Find more information here: www.cost.eu/actions/ca20101 and express your interest to join any of the working groups

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Hi everyone! I am Andrea Paluselli and I am a postDoc at the Italian National Research Council (CNR-ISMAR) in Lerici (Italy). I am working with a very interesting batch of samples at the Department of the Built Environment, Aalborg University (Denmark) thanks to the STSM grant of COST Action PRIORITY.

We collected those samples through sediment traps moored in the Arctic region for over a year and we aim to estimate the vertical fluxes of small microplastics along the water column and their temporal variability.

I've been working together with the colleagues from AAU-BUILD for a few weeks and in the next days I will share few steps of the sample prep and µFTIR analysis.
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And the last picture from me:

Today presenting at the University of Turku, presentation topic:

Microplastics – a tricky indicator for the onset of the Anthropocene due to downward migration
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Day number 4
Here we go!

Today I took a glance at this instrument, called a micro-FTIR, which is broadly preferred and used for polymer identification.

You can see how smart it is. By scanning the sample area and targeting specific points, you get spectra, which compared to those on online databases, can give you valuable information about microplastic consistency.

Isn't it amazing? 🧑‍🔬
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Hi everyone!

It's me (@areti_ko ) again.

Today was my third day in the lab and we did a lot of microscopy examination in search of microplastics.

This process comes along with a lot of patience, it is time consuming and requires experience for the best possible estimation of the solid particles observed.

In this photo you can see the stereomicroscope we used, which is coupled with a camera and a computer.
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Hi everybody! I am Areti Kokkinomagoula, an MSc student from University of Crete, Greece and I will be enjoying these days at University of La Laguna at Tenerife Island within an STSM!

My research interests include the isolation, morphological characterisation and identification of microplastics found in wastewater. Wastewater is really complex, hard to handle sample, but one of the major routes that lead microplastics into the environment.

In the next few days I will be sharing my journey with you! 🌴🧪🔬

#cost #costactions #priority #microplastics #science
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Good morning friends! This us the final picture of my takeover. Today, a new colleague (Areti Kokkinonagoula) will be in charge of this account 😊 I couldn’t finish without a picture with my supervisor here at DTU, Nanna Hartmann 😄. Thank you for everything! And thank you all who engaged last week. Be nice to the next one 🤓
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#dtu #priority #costpriority #costaction
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Hello again folks! Today I show you another method testing. One of the challenges in MP analyses is extracting them from complex organic samples. As you might imagine, is like searching for a needle in a haystack 😩🔬
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What we do to solve this is to digest the organic matter with chemicals, but some of them work, some not. Here, we test hydrogen peroxide and KOH, which one will be the winner? 😏🥊
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For now, it looks like the peroxide is being good to us. On the other side, KOH destroyed the samples (including plastics 😂) in 24h. What a great idea I had 🫠 Pray for Sevil’s samples (the PhD student who’s working on this).
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Hi folks! This is the machine we’re using for microplastics identification, an LDIR🔬
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We put the samples in and gent an infrared (IR) spectrum we have to identify and compare to a known database. 📈🤔
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So yeah, in the process of some method development here! I’ve answered some quedtions in stories, let me know if you have more doubts lefr 😊
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#costaction #science #microplastics #dtu #dtusustain
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Hei there! I’m @olga_novillo, a PhD student from the @universitatvalencia (Spain) and I’m lucky to be enjoying an STSMs at @dtudk Sustain in Denmark within the PRIORITY project ☺️
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During this week, I’ll be taking over this account, telling you what I’m doing and why 🧪🔬
Basically, I’m searching for reliable ways for identifying microplastics in environmental samples and, eventually, to help out a bit to take care of our lovely planet 🌎🌿🌊⛰️
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Please, ask whatever you’re curious about and I’ll be answering along this week! 🤓
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#priority #costactions #dtusustain #microplastics #sustainability #thereisnoplanetb #science #scientistlife
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