Snow sampling for microplastics continues

   From February 25 to March 8, 2022, another expedition of the Tomsk State University took place to take snow samples for microplastics. More than 7 thousand kilometers have been covered across the expanses of Western Siberia from the Altai Mountains to the Arctic Circle. A special feature of the current scientific trip was that it included two separate groups of researchers. The first team, consisting of Alexander Blokhin, Nikolai Rodikov and Valery Suslyaev, courageously covered 5 thousand kilometers, braving the harsh climate, and completing all their tasks including snow sampling at 17 sites.

   The second team, including Danil Vorobyov, Anton and Andrey Trifonov, traveled to Altai and collected snow at 5 points along a 2 thousand kilometers route.

   The results obtained after laboratory analysis will enrich the database created by the Consortium “Microplastics in the Environment”.

   Annual monitoring of the state of the Siberian snow cover and the content of microplastics in it has already become traditional and will allow scientists to better understand the patterns of the spread of such a dangerous pollutant as microplastics, to lay the foundation for the development of methods to reduce its spread and remove it from the environment.