Plastic is often dispersed in the sea, where it degrades into microplastics, with a huge impact on marine flora and fauna. In our physics laboratory we will present the latest spectroscopic techniques for the identification of microplastics and we will perform demonstrative activities for different age groups. Children (6-10 years) will learn to differentiate plastics found in everyday objects on the basis of their density; young students (11-15 years old) will observe – under an optical microscope- the microplastics found in the digestive tract of some fishes and those extracted on site from cosmetic products; adults (16+) will reproduce an experiment for the removal of microplastic from water samples using magnets and iron-fluids.
MARINE PLASTICS PHYSICS LAB
