Table 14. Checklist of necessary information for conducting and reporting environmental microplastics research, adapted from Cowger et al. (2020). * indicates compulsory items to be reported.
| Reported (✓) | Action Item | Define the action or information determined by you and your research team (some examples provided) |
|---|---|---|
| General considerations | ||
| * Has the research question been defined | i.e., Type of microplastics in sea surface waters in the Great Australian Bight | |
| * Which field manual will you follow? | i.e., Water | |
| Are there any existing standard protocols suitable to investigate your research question? | i.e., AIMS Australia, CSIRO Australia | |
| Selection of a sampling design | ||
| Sampling effort required (e.g., power analysis) | i.e., Power analysis completed indicated we needed a minimum of 3 replicates | |
| * Location | i.e., Nuyts Archipelago, Great Australian Bight | |
| * Number of samples to collect per location | i.e., Five | |
| * Number of replicates | i.e., Three (therefore, n = 3, N = 15) | |
| Is my sampling design representative of the habitat/compartment that I wish to answer a research question about? | i.e., Yes | |
| Randomised sampling? | i.e., Yes | |
| Materials & Equipment used | ||
| Devices/equipment & manufacturers | i.e., Rosette sampler niskin bottles | |
| Software | i.e., N/A | |
| How were the devices and software calibrated | i.e., N/A | |
| Quality Assurance & Quality Control | ||
| Defined controls and replication (e.g., field blanks, procedural blanks, airborne contamination control, positive controls, recovery tests) | i.e., Field blanks – 5 per site, Procedural blanks – every 10 samples | |
| Defined and clear limit of detection (e.g., microplastic size constraints) | i.e., Detection limit 20 mm | |
| * Actions taken for contamination mitigation | i.e., For field procedures cotton clothing was worn by operators and niskin bottles were rinsed with ultrapure water between sample collection. For laboratory procedures a laminar hood was used, and 100% cotton lab coats, with leather boots worn in the laboratory. Reported in report | |
| Control correction procedure/s on the environmental data | i.e., N/A | |
| Laboratory and equipment cleaning procedures | i.e., Clean room. All labware were washed with ultrapure water and dried in laminar flow | |
| Reagent purification methods | i.e., All reagents were filtered with 0.45 mm filter paper | |
| Field Sampling | ||
| * Record of field location (including GPS coordinates), sampling date, and time | i.e., Yes GPS for sites recorded in excel spreadsheet with dates and time | |
| Records of additional environmental conditions where applicable (e.g., air temperature, wind, tides, water temperature, pH, and salinity) | i.e., Yes see GPS spreadsheet for recorded water and air temperature and wind | |
| Surface area or volume of sample collected from environmental matrices, with appropriate units | i.e., 10 L per bottle | |
| * Composition of the sample | i.e., Water | |
| Description of sampling equipment and relevant dimensions used to collect the samples, and any cleaning procedures between sample collection | i.e., CTD rosette sampler brand x. Niskin bottles were rinsed with ultrapure water between sample collection | |
| * Depth and/or position the sample was collected from | i.e., 10 m below surface, >1 km from shore | |
| * Description of other sampling methodologies (e.g., vessel speed when towing a net, direction of travel, speed and direction of current, amount of water filtered) | i.e., vessel speed 0 knots, wind 10 knots SW, | |
| Storage of samples from the field to the laboratory | i.e., samples stored in cold, dark store room | |
| Laboratory Processing | ||
| Specification of reagents | i.e., per analysis grade | |
| Specification on the laboratory equipment used and all relevant details | i.e., Leica M80 stereo microscope, Whatman glass fibre filters | |
| Process for separation of microplastics from environmental matrices | ||
| * Sieving | i.e., Not required | |
| Visual Separation | i.e., Microscope | |
| * Density Separation (e.g., solution composition, concentration, volume per sample) | i.e., Not required | |
| * Chemical Digestion (e.g., chemicals used, duration of digestion, temperature, hear source, voume per sample, caveats of digestion method) |
i.e., Not required | |
| Filtration information | i.e., Filtered materials through 0.45 mm glass fibre filter | |
| Microplastic Categorisation & Identification for Large & Small Microplastics | ||
| Quantification | ||
| Determine method for quantification, refer to Table 10 under “Microplastic Quantification” | i.e., Manual counting | |
| * Record of relevant information for quantification type | i.e., Visual identification: limit of detection was 20 mm | |
| Physical Characterisation | ||
| Type (refer to “Physical Characterisation, Type table” within this manual) | i.e., Yes, see results spreadsheet | |
| Colour | i.e., Yes, see results spreadsheet | |
| Size (refer to “Physical Characterisation, Size table” within this manual), where possible a more accurate information on individual particle sizes/volumes | i.e., Yes, see results spreadsheet | |
| Chemical Characterisation | ||
| Determination of polymer type (refer to “Chemical Characterisation” within this manual) | i.e., Yes, FTIR model x used, see results spreadsheet | |
| * Record of relevant information for determining polymer type (e.g., size limits, pre-processing steps, acquisition parameters, spectral matching software/techniques/or methodology) | i.e., micro-FTIR manual sample loading, Bruker library x, spectral range set between 3,900 and 650 cm-1 with 2,500 and 1,900 cm-1 excluded | |
| Percentage of total microplastic samples tested | i.e., 50% | |
| Data Management | ||
| Units and size dimensions reported, must be comparable | i.e., Yes units per sample, weight and raw data were included in the report | |
| Where possible, inclusion of average values with reports for variability (only possible with replication) | i.e., Yes mean and standard error reported | |
| Data submitted to an open access portal (e.g., AODN, Marine Plastics Portal) | i.e., Yes data submitted to AODN | |
| Raw data of counts to be included in the Supplementary Information or uploaded to suitable site (e.g. figshare). Aim to meet FAIR Guiding Principles for scientific data. | i.e., Yes raw data included | |
| Reporting Results | ||
| * The load (e.g. microplastic concentrations estimated, post inclusion of control data). | i.e., Yes microplastic load per litre reported. | |
| * The lower limit of size category | i.e., Only plastics >20 µm were recorded | |
| The physical characteristics (e.g. type, colour, sizes) | i.e., Yes – type, size and colour is reported | |
| The chemical characteristics (presence and proportions of the different polymer types) | i.e., Yes – polymer type for 50% of samples tested reported | |
| Contextual information and metadata (such as environmental data) | i.e., Yes included in the Materials and Methods section and supplementary information | |
| Other considerations | ||
| Can the results be published in an Open Access Journal? | i.e., Yes | |