Aging Significantly Affects Mobility and Contaminant-Mobilizing Ability of Nanoplastics in Saturated Loamy Sand

Plastic debris, in particular, microplastics and nanoplastics, is becoming an emerging class of pollutants of global concern. Aging can significantly affect the physicochemical properties of plastics, and therefore, may influence the fate, transport, and effects of these materials. Here, we show that aging by UV or O3 exposure drastically enhanced the mobility and contaminant-mobilizing ability of spherical polystyrene nanoplastics (PSNPs, 487.3 ± 18.3 nm in diameter) in saturated loamy sand. Extended Derjaguin–Landau–Verwey–Overbeek calculations and pH-dependent transport experiments demonstrated that the greater mobility of the aged PSNPs was mainly the result of surface oxidation of the nanoplastics, which increased not only the surface charge negativity, but more importantly, hydrophilicity of the materials. The increased mobility of the aged PSNPs significantly contributed to their elevated contaminant-mobilizing abilities. Moreover, aging of PSNPs enhanced the binding of both nonpolar and polar contaminants, further increasing the contaminant-mobilizing ability of PSNPs. Interestingly, aging enhanced binding of nonpolar versus polar compounds via distinctly different mechanisms: increased binding of nonpolar contaminants (tested using pyrene) was mainly the result of the modification of the polymeric structure of PSNPs that exacerbated slow desorption kinetics; for polar compounds (4-nonylphenol), aging induced changes in surface properties also resulted in irreversible adsorption of contaminants through polar interactions, such as hydrogen bonding. The findings further underline the significant effects of aging on environmental fate and implications of nanoplastics.