Expanded microplastics toxicity database helping to advance California’s microplastics management strategy

SCCWRP and its partners have nearly doubled the size of a public, web-based repository of toxicity data summarizing how microplastics exposure adversely affects humans and aquatic life – a major expansion that better positions the database to serve as a scientific foundation for microplastics management, not only in California but around the world.

The new version of the Toxicity of Microplastics Explorer (ToMEx), known as ToMEx 2.0 and unveiled in June, reflects microplastics toxicity data from more than 350 high-quality, published scientific studies, including about 150 studies that were published after the original version of ToMEx was developed.

Already, researchers are making plans to use the expanded database to refine preliminary microplastics exposure thresholds for aquatic life; the preliminary thresholds for California were originally derived using the first version of ToMEx. Researchers also plan to use the database to begin identifying aquatic organisms that could become bioindicator species to routinely monitor for potential adverse effects from microplastics exposure.

Meanwhile, California’s microplastics toxicity database is being leveraged around the world to develop microplastics management frameworks and strategies, including Japan and Canada. The International Joint Commission, which manages water quality and other issues for the Great Lakes, announced earlier this year that it is adapting California’s microplastics risk management framework, including ToMEx, for the Great Lakes. And researchers in Japan are leveraging ToMEx to conduct a preliminary risk assessment of microplastics in Tokyo Bay.