Prioritizing Suitable Quality Assurance and Control Standards to Reduce Laboratory Airborne Microfibre Contamination in Sediment Samples

• Main Authors: Sara L. Belontz, Patricia L. Corcoran
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2021-09-01
• Series: Environments
• Subjects: microplastics; quality assurance; quality control; microfibres; sediment; airborne contamination
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3298/8/9/89

The ubiquity and distribution of microplastics, particularly microfibres, in outdoor and indoor environments makes it challenging when assessing and controlling background contamination, as atmospheric particles can be unintentionally introduced into a sample during laboratory analysis. As such, an intra-laboratory examination and literature review was completed to quantify background contamination in sediment samples, in addition to comparing reported quality assurance and control (QA/QC) protocols in 50 studies examining microplastics in sediment from 2010 to 2021. The intra-lab analysis prioritizes negative controls, placing procedural blanks in various working labs designed to prepare, process, and microscopically analyse microplastics in sediment. All four labs are subject to microfibre contamination; however, following the addition of alternative clean-air devices (microscope enclosure and HEPA air purifiers), contamination decreased by 66% in laboratory B, and 70% in laboratory C. A review of microplastic studies suggests that 82% are not including or reporting alternative clean-air devices in their QA/QC approaches. These studies are found to be at greater risk of secondary contamination, as 72% of them ranked as medium to high contamination risk. It is imperative that laboratories incorporate matrix-specific QA/QC approaches to minimize false positives and improve transparency and harmonization across studies.