The research team eats microplastics while chewing gum...Up to 3000 per each
Mar 26, 2025
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Microplastics break away from plastic tools in daily life and enter the human body through food, water, and breathing, and the average amount of microplastics consumed is 2,000 per week, equivalent to one credit card weighing about 5 grams.
At the American Chemical Society Spring 2025 (ACS Spring 2025) held in San Diego on the 26th, a team led by Professor Sanjay Mohanty of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) confirmed that hundreds to thousands of microplastics come out in a single gum.
According to the research team, gum is usually made with a rubber base and sweeteners, spices, and other ingredients. Natural gum products use vegetable polymers such as chicle and other tree sap, while others use synthetic rubber bases made of petroleum-based polymers.
The research team asked participants to chew five brands of synthetic and natural gum on the market to measure the speed and amount of microplastics in saliva. An average of 100 microplastics were released per gram of gum, up to 637 microplastics, according to the survey. This means that up to 3,000 microplastics can come from a single gum, which usually weighs 2 to 6 grams, the research team said, noting that chewing 160 to 180 small gum per year could consume tens of thousands of microplastics per year.
In addition, since most microplastics were released within the first two minutes of chewing gum and 94% were released within eight minutes of chewing gum, chewing a piece longer than chewing a new gum reduces the possibility of exposure to microplastics.
The research team said the findings suggest that microplastics can be consumed directly when chewing gum, potentially posing health risks, adding that further research is needed to assess the possibility of nanometer (one-billionth of a meter) plastic release.
This article was translated by Naver AI translator.
