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While studying human tissue samples can tell us where micro- and nanoplastics are located, it can’t tell us much about how they travel within the body. Understanding that mechanism is the focus of Dr. Phoebe Stapleton at Rutgers University in New Jersey. She runs the lab where Sam Adams is a graduate student.

Stapleton didn’t set out to study plastics. A toxicologist, her background is in how air pollution affects cardiovascular function. When she arrived as an associate professor at Rutgers, she became interested in if—and how—inhaled plastic particles cross the placenta, from mom to baby.

In the fall of 2020, she was studying polystyrene, a common polymer used to make plastic cutlery and styrofoam. Her team found that in rats, inhaled polystyrene nanoplastics cross the placental barrier that separates maternal and fetal blood. That means the placenta’s key function, keeping pollutants from reaching the fetus, wasn’t holding up when it came to plastic. That discovery felt like taking a blindfold off, she says.

“After that, your work kind of changes,” Stapleton says. “And you realize just how much plastic exposure people are having, just how much we’re surrounded by it.”

Stapleton’s lab is now focused on identifying how plastic particles may be affecting pregnancy and lactation. One area she’s looking at is glucose metabolism, which is important for hormone regulation and weight management. Glucose is also necessary for fetal growth. Stapleton’s lab has found that rats exposed to high levels of microplastics have smaller pups. Her colleagues have theorized that MNPs could stress the placenta and cause it to keep more glucose to itself, which could restrict the growth of the fetus, but early research is inconclusive.

(Source: Science Friday – August 21, 2026)

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