Detection of Microplastics using Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy - A first approach

The worldwide inability to enforce effective plastic guidelines results in an increasing accumulation of microplastics in natural habitats. Since this problem is in need of human intervention, we propose Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) as a new tool to identify microplastics. Our results illustrate that LIBS could be a method to identify microplastics from the environment. Based on the spectral fingerprint of different plastic types, microplastics seem to be distinguishable from non-plastic materials and from their base polymer.