A study published this month in the International Journal of Impotence Research found – as far as researchers can tell – the first detection of microplastics in penises. Microplastics are the breakdown products of plastics in our daily lives that are smaller than 5 millimeters long. Think residue from water bottles or food containers.

The theory is that whether it’s drinking from plastic water bottles or from eating food in a plastic container, people are ingesting microplastics that are then deposited throughout the body. They may also be exposed through inhaling these tiny pieces, too, or even directly through the skin. “These particles can penetrate the body directly via the atmosphere, drinking water, and sea salt or indirectly through the food chain,” according to the study.

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When plastic trash is dumped in a landfill or the sea, it breaks down very slowly. Sunlight and waves cause the surface of the plastic to become brittle, and particles are shed into the environment. Collectively known as “small plastic particles,” they range in size from five millimeters or smaller (microplastics) to less than one-thousandth of a millimeter (nano plastics). The smallest can only be detected with special scientific instruments.

It remains unclear how microplastics and nanoplastics get inside living things, but several entry points have been suggested. For example, they might pass through the gut from food or drink contaminated with small plastic particles. Or they may be breathed in, or absorbed through the skin.

Our research suggests that, for some animals, nanoplastics are bad news. We injected plastic nanoparticles into chicken embryos. We found that the particles traveled quickly in the blood to all tissues, especially the heart, liver, and kidneys. They were also excreted by the embryonic kidneys.

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The time has come for us to stop “recycling” plastic. Plastic as a material is not recyclable, and the very best thing we can do to celebrate Earth Day this year is to acknowledge that fact.

Unlike paper, glass and metal, plastic is not easily, efficiently turned into new products. What passes for “recycling” plastic is costly, energy-intensive and toxic. On top of all that, the process requires the addition of a shocking amount of new virgin plastic — around 70 percent — to hold the newly formed plastic item together. As a result, only about 5 percent of plastic gets “recycled” (or, more accurately, “downcycled” into a product of inferior quality). Compare that with a 68 percent recycling rate for paper and cardboard.

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In an era marked by increased environmental consciousness, the plastics industry faces significant scrutiny. Critics are calling out the longstanding narrative promoted by the sector that plastic is predominantly recyclable. This notion has been strongly challenged by experts and environmental advocates who allege that the industry has misled the public through deceptive practices.

Jan Dell, a former chemical engineer and founder of the non-profit The Last Beach Cleanup, has voiced concerns about the effectiveness of plastic recycling. According to Dell, the familiar recycling symbols on plastic products suggest a recyclability that does not exist for the vast majority. This is supported by startling statistics from the Department of Energy, which reports that only 5 to 6 percent of the 48 million tons of plastic waste produced annually in the U.S. is recycled. The remainder is largely destined for landfills or incineration.

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Microplastics result from the breakdown of plastic waste, like plastic bags and bottles. They are apparently contained even in drinking water and have reportedly been detected in the human body, although their effects on the human body aren’t fully understood. The team says microplastics might spread throughout the body and cause inflammation.

Clogging of the carotid artery is known to contribute to atherosclerosis, and is often surgically removed. The team examined the plaques removed from 257 asymptomatic individuals aged 18 to 75 in Italy and discovered microplastics in 150 people, or 58% of cases. Microplastics were found specifically within immune cells, which showed increased inflammation markers.

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The comprehensive study, conducted by researchers at the nonprofit Ocean Conservancy, found that approximately 88% of protein samples tested contained microplastic particles.

“Highly processed products contained the most microplastics per gram,” the study said in its findings. “Microplastic contamination did not differ between brands or store types.”

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Hyatt’s invention, often described as the world’s first commercially produced plastic, was followed a few decades later by Bakelite. Bakelite was followed by polyvinyl chloride, which was, in turn, followed by polyethylene, low-density polyethylene, polyester, polypropylene, Styrofoam, Plexiglas, Mylar, Teflon, polyethylene terephthalate (familiarly known as PET)—the list goes on and on. And on. Annual global production of plastic currently runs to more than eight hundred billion pounds. What was a problem of scarcity is now a problem of superabundance.

In the form of empty water bottles, used shopping bags, and tattered snack packages, plastic waste turns up pretty much everywhere today. It has been found at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, thirty-six thousand feet below sea level. It litters the beaches of Svalbard and the shores of the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, in the Indian Ocean, most of which are uninhabited. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a collection of floating debris that stretches across six hundred thousand square miles between California and Hawaii, is thought to contain some 1.8 trillion plastic shards. Among the many creatures being done in by all this junk are corals, tortoises, and elephants—in particular, the elephants of Sri Lanka. In recent years, twenty of them have died after ingesting plastic at a landfill near the village of Pallakkadu.

How worried should we be about what’s become known as “the plastic pollution crisis”? And what can be done about it? These questions lie at the heart of several recent books that take up what one author calls “the plastic trap.”

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These particles can range from about the size of pollen (microplastics) down to a fraction of the size of a virus (nanoplastics), and they have penetrated water supplies, agricultural soil beds, and natural and domestic food chains.

Knowledge of the effects of ingesting microplastics and nanoplastics has been limited by their ubiquitous nature—making it difficult to find populations of unaffected individuals to act as control groups—and the lack of relevant laboratory models for studying the particles’ effects on cells. In a study published in Nanomedicine, researchers at Tufts University School of Engineering have found potential inflammatory effects of plastic particles using human intestinal organoids — small bundles of tissue made from a mix of human cells obtained from biopsies that mimic the complexity of an actual intestinal environment.

Notably, the researchers found that higher concentrations of plastic particles triggered the secretion of inflammatory molecules linked to human inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).

Earlier clinical studies have found plastics accumulated in different tissues of living organisms, including the digestive tract, blood, liver, pancreas, heart, and even the brain. The most likely first point of entry is through the intestine. Studies on rats and other animals have found that while microplastics and nanoplastics may accumulate in the intestine and other tissues, there are conflicting results on toxic effects or inflammation, which may depend on particle size, length of exposure, and pre-existing conditions. Controversy remains as to whether there are any toxicological effects on humans, as results in animal studies don’t always track with human outcomes.

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The good news here is that filtration makes a difference: Without it, the researchers calculated that this single recycling facility could emit up to 6.5 million pounds of microplastic per year. Filtration got it down to an estimated 3 million pounds. “So it definitely was making a big impact when they installed the filtration,” says Brown. “We found particularly high removal efficiency of particles over 40 microns.”

But a critical caveat is that the team only tested for microplastics down to 1.6 microns. Plastic particles can get way smaller—like nanoplastics that are tiny enough to enter individual cells—and they grow much more numerous as they do. So this is likely a significant underestimate. And these researchers were finding a lot of particularly small particles. In two of the sample points, approximately 95 percent of the microplastics were under 10 microns, and 85 percent were under 5 microns. “It completely shocked me just how tiny the majority of them were,” says Brown. “But we easily could have found so many smaller than that.”

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But what recent research suggests is that such easily visible garbage is “just the very tip of the iceberg” when it comes to the world’s plastic problem, says Matt Simon, science reporter at Wired and author of A Poison Like No Other: How Microplastics Corrupted Our Planet and Our Bodies. Beneath the surface, both literally and figuratively, is a massive number (in the trillions) of tiny microplastics and even tinier nanoplastics that are “accessible to the entire tree of life,” he says.

Occurring in a variety of shapes and colors, these mini plastics are unified by their size. Scientists refer to any plastics smaller than five millimeters (about the size of a sesame seed) as microplastics and have recently differentiated the very smallest of these pieces, smaller than 100 nanometers, as nanoplastics, which are not visible to the naked eye. The particular trouble that these tiny plastics pose is two-fold: It’s very tough to clean them up, and it’s very easy for them to pollute our ecosystems, as they can be either ingested or inhaled, or both, by all living things.

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