About this project

Why microplastics

I came to this through engineering. I am interested in how living things solve physical problems, and filtering is one of the oldest: fish, bivalves, and whales have been straining particles from water for millions of years without pumps or replacement cartridges. While reading about attempts to copy those structures, I kept running into microplastics as the pollutant people most wanted to remove, and into wildly different numbers for how much of it there is.

The numbers differed because the studies could see different sizes of particle, not because someone was wrong. That distinction almost never made it into the articles I read. This site exists to keep it visible.

The site uses California, and sometimes Claremont, as its worked example. That is a choice of lens, not of subject: a named creek makes a global pathway concrete, and every reader has an equivalent creek.

What I am working on

• This website

  An evidence-labelled guide to microplastics, using California as the worked example, with a consumption calculator, a local source predictor, case studies, and a blog that records what changes and why.

  Read the blog

• A non-motorized, biomimetic microplastic filter

  A research project that borrows the geometry of fish gill rakers to design a passive filter for stormwater or a creek intake. I am modelling pore angles computationally, then 3D-printing and testing prototypes on a small sensor rig. Lab work is planned for late 2026.

  Why biomimetic filters work

• A citizen-science club at school

  A group where students estimate their own exposure, collect local data, and invite scientists, museum educators, and nonprofit staff to talk about what the numbers do and do not mean.

• Local advocacy

  Reaching out to environmental organizations around Claremont and the Inland Empire to see where a student can help, and documenting the organizations on the Take Action page for anyone else who wants to start.

  See the organizations

How the site is made

Evidence labels

Every major claim is marked well established, emerging, or still uncertain, and the site says plainly when detection has not been shown to mean harm.

One source per number

Figures link to the study they came from. The calculator shows the single published coefficient behind each subtotal instead of averaging papers together.

One place as the example

California has the first statewide microplastics strategy in the country and one of the most complete regional studies, in San Francisco Bay. The site uses it as the worked example because a named creek is more memorable than a global average, not because the problem stops at a state line.

No accounts, minimal data

The calculator keeps your answers on your device and contributes them anonymously to a small open dataset. There is nothing to sell and no advertising.

Contact

Corrections, questions, and teachers who want to use the lesson are all welcome. If a link is broken or a number is wrong, I will fix it and note the change on the blog.