UVic PhD candidate working on microplastics test kit [Video]

Abbas Motalebizadeh is a PhD candidate at the University of Victoria’s Mechanical Engineering Department and on Wednesday he was at the Victoria International Marina to test the Inner Harbour for microplastics.

“I believe it’s in everything,” said Motalebizadeh.

His test showed microplastics are present in the harbour, in abundance.

“It worries me,” said Craig Norris, the CEO of the Victoria International Marina.

Norris says the problem of microplastics is larger than people realize.

“The world is producing and using plastics, the world is throwing away plastics and it is getting in the world’s food supply,” said Norris.

There is already a way to test for microplastics, but it involves an expensive and time consuming process of sending samples to a lab.

Motalebizadeh and his colleagues at the University of Victoria’s Micro and Nano Technology Lab are in the process of creating and bringing to market what they say is the first ever portable testing device for microplastics.

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