Background: Plastic is the most polluting substance in the marine environment. Due to the fact that plastic waste does not decompose in a short period of time under the influence of ultraviolet (UV) rays, mechanical abrasion, temperature fluctuation and biological decomposition, it weathers and forms small microplastic pieces. Microplastics are important carriers for organic and inorganic pollutants, which have diverse functional groups, small particle size and neutral electrical surface and create easy movement in soil and water.
Aim: This study was conducted by investigating the amount of absorption of two organic and inorganic pollutants in polyethylene microplastic.
. Methodology: This study was conducted at Bushehr Persian Gulf Research Institute and the adsorption of metal and antibiotics in heavy polyethylene microplastics in an aqueous environment in an individual and combined system under the influence of conditions (salinity, contact time, pH, plastic particle size, microplastic dosage and concentrations ) were investigated differently, as well as adsorption kinetics, isotherm models of adsorption of heavy polyethylene microplastics with cadmium and cephalexin.
Conclusions: The results of the experiments showed that the adsorption of metal in microplastic happened quickly and after 90 minutes it reached equilibrium and the influence of environmental factors on absorption, which increased metal adsorption in microplastic with increasing pH and decreased adsorption with increasing salinity. The presence of cephalexin antibiotic had a negative effect on metal adsorption on polyethylene microplastic, and the presence of cephalexin antibiotic had no effect on the type of isotherm and kinetic model of metal absorption. The maximum metal absorption capacity in microplastic was 1.7 mg/g.