Environmental Plastic and Innovation Cluster
Research Themes
Our impact
Plastic ingestion by humans
Our study takes a closer look at the knowledge gap on what plastic pollution means for human nutrition. The study estimates the average amount of plastic ingested by humans by analysing and synthesising the existing but limited literature on the topic.
Our results confirm global concerns about the large quantity of plastic the average person living in a developed country ingests every day.
National Citizen Science project
The Australian Microplastic Assessment Project (AUSMAP), a citizen science project that is tracking plastic pollution along Australia’s coast and waterways. EPIC is a major partner in the Australian Microplastic Assessment Project (AUSMAP), In collaboration with Total Environment Centre (Dr. Michelle Blewitt) and Macquarie University (Dr. Scott Wilson) EPIC contributed to developing standard sampling protocol for microplastics, characterizing the microplastics samples collected around Australia to improve understanding on the source & fate of Microplastics in the Australian Environment. The hotspot map enables the community to see where microplastics are found in Australia, and discover details about the colour, type and size of the microplastics found in that particular spot. AUSMAP won the coveted 2021 Australian museum Eureka prize.
Contact us
General Enquiries
The University of Newcastle acknowledges the traditional custodians of the lands within our footprint areas: Awabakal, Darkinjung, Biripai, Worimi, Wonnarua, and Eora Nations. We also pay respect to the wisdom of our Elders past and present.