Microplastic abundance and morphology in the surface water from Head Panjnad, Punjab, Pakistan (2023)

This dataset provides geo-referenced measurements of microplastic (MP) occurrence, abundance, morphological characterization, and FTIR polymer identification across three environmental matrices — surface water, riverbed sediment, and gastrointestinal tracts (GIT) of the freshwater catfish (Wallago attu Bloch & Schneider, 1801) — collected from Head Panjnad, Punjab, Pakistan (29.347842° N, 71.028484° E) in 2023. Head Panjnad represents the confluence of all five major Punjab rivers (Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi, Beas, and Sutlej), constituting a key node of the Indus River Basin. Ten specimens of W. attu were morphometrically characterized and their GITs examined for MPs. Parallel water and sediment samples (n = 10 each) were processed through KOH/HNO₃ digestion, Whatman filtration, and stereomicroscopy, with polymer identity confirmed by FTIR spectroscopy. Mean GIT MP burden was 12.08 ± 3.47 items/individual. Surface water MP concentration averaged 79.42 ± 17.82 items/m³. Riverbed sediment MP constituted a mean of 0.148% of total solids. Fiber morphotype dominated all three matrices (65–74%). PE, PP, nylon, and probable polyester (PET) were confirmed by FTIR across matrices. All data values in this submission are summary statistics (mean, SD, SE, min, max) aggregated over n = 10 replicates per matrix; individual-level raw data are not available.