Descripción del proyecto
Estudio de la salud del suelo en la era del plástico
El suelo es un recurso finito fundamental para garantizar la seguridad alimentaria y un futuro sostenible. Por desgracia, los suelos constituyen un sumidero de plástico: la acumulación de microplásticos en los suelos es un problema al alza, pero se sabe muy poco sobre el impacto del plástico en la salud del suelo. En el proyecto SoPla_Fate, financiado con fondos europeos, se empleará un método multidisciplinario para colmar esta brecha del conocimiento que permitirá examinar el alcance de la contaminación por plásticos en suelos agrícolas, así como el destino y el efecto del plástico en los procesos edáficos. El equipo del proyecto cuantificará primero la distribución y la concentración de polímeros en suelos agrícolas y, a continuación, analizará, cribará e identificará los aditivos plásticos y su comportamiento de lixiviación y fraccionamiento.
Objetivo
Soil provides us with 98.8% of our food and by 2050 we need to increase the production by 70%; yet our soils are degrading. Soils were recently recognised as a sink for plastic. This is particularly of concern for agricultural soil health due to extensive and increasing plastic use in farming such as plastic mulching and unintentional plastic introduction through biosolid applications. Based on plastic persistence, widespread use and recent results in soil eco toxicology and eco system effects, plastic has been proposed as driver of global change. However, critical data to clarify the impact of plastic on soil health is currently lacking. This project employs a multidisciplinary approach to determine the extent of plastic contamination in agricultural soils as well as the fate of plastic and its impact on soil processes while providing training and knowledge gain that will be transferred to the EU and further exploited.
SoPla_Fate will address the current knowledge lack by (1) quantifying the polymer distribution and concentration in different agricultural soils. Polymer properties including size, shape and surface area will be quantified for representative samples. (2) State-of-the-art analytical instruments and workflows will be employed for the fingerprinting, screening and identification of plastic additives. (3) The workflows will further be employed to determine the leaching and partitioning behaviour of additives from plastic and aged plastic into the soil environment. (4) The impact of different plastic aspects such as polymer type, additive composition and aging induced changes to polymers and plastic on vital soil processes will be quantified. The outcomes from SoPla_Fate will advance our assessment of potential soil health impairment though plastic pollution highlighting the importance of an integrated multidisciplinary research connecting plastic fate in soil with its impact.
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MSCA-IF - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF)Coordinador
14195 Berlin
Alemania