> Repeat all steps in exactly the same way, but use distilled water. You can even do all the steps and use no water!

This is where I get lost. Maybe I don't understand what a blank is.

If you have access to distilled water that you have excellent reason to believe is free from what you're detecting, then great. But my point is we don't have access to animal flesh guaranteed to be free of microplastics, do we? Because they're everywhere in the environment.

And if you use no water at all, it seems like you're missing the entire vector of contamination from acquiring and transporting the water. E.g. if the water container is producing contamination, then your blank of no water isn't revealing the source of contamination! The blank isn't helping at all.

I don't have any issue with the concept of a blank sample when they're feasible. My issue is, I don't see how you can produce a blank sample of animal tissue without microplastics specifically because microplastics are everywhere in nature, and I don't see how a slide with zero animal tissue at all is a useful blank.

▲ godelski 19 hours ago | parent | next [-]

  > If you have access to distilled water that you have excellent reason to believe is free from what you're detecting

Don't make assumptions.

  > we don't have access to animal flesh guaranteed to be free of microplastics, do we?

Don't make assumptions.

These two assumptions could potentially be at odds.

  > And if you use no water at all, it seems like you're missing the entire vector of contamination from acquiring and transporting the water.

Don't use water? Use another liquid that doesn't interact the same way. I gave examples, they are clearly non-exhaustive.

I don't have an answer for you for the exact process but I'm also not a scientist working on these experiments. But the people who are doing the experiments are. They know the answers to these questions. A lot of it is going to be detailed in the papers but some won't be because it's more common knowledge among the niche, but you'd likely learn it if you pursued a PhD in the domain

	▲	crazygringo 15 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Just so you know, the tone of your comment is extremely off-putting. I don't have the slightest idea why you're rudely telling me "don't make assumptions", especially if you don't have additional information to add. And the suggestion to "pursue a PhD in the domain" if I want answers is exceedingly obnoxious. If you don't have helpful answers, you don't need to leave a comment. You don't need to say that you don't have answers but add a bunch of rude sentences while you do it. Better to just not reply at all.

▲ BlarfMcFlarf 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

It doesn’t have to be an identical material, just one that has similar properties in attracting and holding contaminants.

	▲	crazygringo 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		So if you're studying slices of e.g. brain to look for microplastic particles, what would be a material with similar properties, that you would then go through the same steps of preserving, preparing, slicing, mounting, etc.? I'm genuinely curious. Are there standard widely used stand-in materials for animal flesh, for plant materials, etc.?