Thailand’s Faye islands are not the usual point for the sun -filled paradise PhD. But for Sarah Sajdi, she, a soft, sandy coast – or so, which was found under her, brought her axis from business career to educational place.
She says, “I was standing there and watching this beautiful sight of the Andaman Sea, and then I looked down and all these pieces of plastic under my feet were all of them, most of them.”
“I’ve always been fond of waste lack, but I realized that it was a problem with consumption.”
Sajidi, BSc ’91, decided to return to Concordia for pursuit of PhD, focusing on plastic waste. As a leading provider of environmental, health and safety software, as a co -founder of the Era Environmental Management Solutions, it has brought decades to finish its education.
His latest article, appeared in Journal of hazardous materialsA use looks at science around the health risks created by plastic water bottles. She says, and seriously they are not considered seriously.
Little threats, very little known
In a review of more than 140 scientific articles, Sajidi writes that an average of 39,000 to 52,000 microplastic particles each year enters, and bottle water consumers use 90,000 more particles from tap water users.
The particles are usually hidden from the bare eye. A microplastic particle can occur between a micron – one thousand one mm – up to five mm. Nonoplastics are smaller than a micron.
When they are made, stored, transported, transported and broken throughout their lives. Since they are often made of low -quality plastic, they smoke small pieces each time when they are manipulated and they face sunlight and temperature fluctuations. And unlike other types of plastic particles, which enter the human bodies through food chain, they are consumed directly from the source.
As Sajidi notes, health results can be severe. Once inside the body, these small plastic can cross the biological boundaries, enter the bloodstream and reach important organs. It can cause chronic inflammation, oxidative stress on the cells, hormonal obstruction, poor reproduction, nerve damage and various cancers. However, the long -term effects are considered bad due to the lack of widespread testing and measurements and standards of detection.
Sajidi has identified a number of methods that researchers used to measure nano and microplastics, each with their own strengths and weaknesses. Some, for example, can detect very small particles but cannot identify their chemical composition. Others can provide details about their makeup but lose small plastic. And excellent, modern and highly reliable tools are often extremely expensive and are not always available.
Education is the best prevention
Sajidi is encouraged by the legislative process, which has been adopted by governments around the world, which aims to restrict plastic waste. However, she notes that the most common goals are the only use of plastic bags, straws and packaging. Very few water bottles pressurize the problem.
She says, “Education is the most important step we can take.” “It is okay to drink water from plastic bottles in an emergency, but it is not something that should be used in daily life. People need to understand that the problem is not severe – it is chronic toxic.”
Chunjiang AnnAssociate Professor, and Xi ChinProfessor, I Department building, civil and environmental engineering On Jenna Cody School of Engineering and Computer Science Assisted in this article.
The research was co -operation by Canada and the University of Konkordia University Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council.
