Ingestion and Types of Microplastic in Meretrix lyrata from Buntal Bay Sarawak through Nile Red Fluorescent Tagging
Microplastic had emerged as new form of plastic pollution. Many ingestions in biota were reported worldwide. Filter feeder such as bivalves are prone to microplastic ingestion Shellfish were usually consumed as whole, without gut removal. This poses a threat towards human consumption. In this stu...
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English English English |
| Published: |
UNIMAS
2025
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| Online Access: | http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/49646/ |
| Abstract | Abstract here |
| Summary: | Microplastic had emerged as new form of plastic pollution. Many ingestions in biota were
reported worldwide. Filter feeder such as bivalves are prone to microplastic ingestion
Shellfish were usually consumed as whole, without gut removal. This poses a threat towards
human consumption. In this study, hard shell clam (Meretrix lyrata) was chosen and
collected 4 times (2 times in both October 2020 (pre-monsoon) and March 2021 (post
monsoon) from local fish market (Kampung Buntal Wet Market) to investigate the factor of
size class and harvesting season towards the ingestion rate of Meretrix lyrata. Fluorescent
tagging using Nile red dye were used to aid the quantification process. Polymer identification
were done on isolated suspected particles using Nicolet IN10 µ-FTIR and compared to an
open-source FTIR reference library OpenSpecy. All samples (81 samples) in this study were
positive with microplastic ingestion. A total of 15867 microplastic were quantified, the most
dominant shape type is particle type (89%). The average microplastic size was 0.043 mm
0.069 mm, and average of 195.90 ± 43.6 microplastic/individuals. Results shows that smaller
sized clam tends to ingest more microplastic compare to larger sized clams. There were no
significant differences (p= 0.05) in microplastic ingestion according to harvesting season
This might indicate that habitats for M. lyrata have pervasive microplastic pollution. PVC
PP with silicate mix, resin dispersion and PDMS were the four polymers identified from the
microplastic particles isolated. All four were common polymers that can be found at place
with human settlements. Fluorescent tagging using Nile red is a good method in
quantification of microplastic however modification and precautionary steps were needed to
obtain optimum results are important for microplastic detection improvements. |
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