240,000 plastic particles found in every bottle of water you drink.

The Aelo Straw removes up to 90% of microplastics from your drinking water as you sip.

The Aelo Straw removes up to 90% of microplastics. Read the full report below.

Not long at all. Setup takes less than a minute. The Aelo Straw filters water as you sip. No jug to fill. No waiting.

Not hard at all. Use it like your usual straw. The filter sits inside, so you can keep your everyday routine.

The Aelo Straw removes up to 90% of microplastics, down to 0.5 micrometers (500 nanometers). Smaller nanoplastics are harder to measure and require specialized equipment.

Our focus is a practical step: filtering microplastics from the water you drink, with particle-test results you can inspect. If you want that extra filtration step without changing your routine, Aelo is built for you.

Your first one or two sips take a little extra effort while the filter primes. After that, it’s easy. We guarantee the Aelo Straw is easier to drink through than any other filter straw on the market.

No. Aelo filters are designed for water. They are intentionally effective, so they can also capture flavor compounds, sugars, syrups, oils, and other ingredients that make drinks taste the way they do. Using Aelo with coffee, juice, soda, sports drinks, or flavored beverages can change the taste and shorten the life of the filter.

“Filtered” can mean different things. Microplastic removal depends on the filter design, the size of the particles and how the filter is maintained. A 2023 study of three household filter devices found that performance varied, with membrane-equipped devices performing better than the carbon-and-ion-exchange-only device tested.

Aelo is designed to add a final filtration step as you drink, wherever you fill up. If your existing filter is already tested for microplastic removal, any additional benefit depends on what remains in your water.

The filter cartridge is stainless steel, with hollow carbon fiber filter media inside. The Aelo Straw is food-grade silicone, and the telescoping straw is stainless steel.

The straw is just the beginning. We’re developing more ways to filter your drinking water. Join the pre-launch waitlist to hear about future Aelo products and be among the first to know when they’re announced.

We have partnered with a recycling facility that can destroy used filter media and the microplastics captured within it. Once per quarter, you’ll send your used cartridges to our California facility for processing.

Our closed-loop return program is designed to collect what your filters capture and send it for destruction. The goal is to remove captured microplastics from circulation, rather than return them to the environment. We’ll share return instructions before the program begins.

Microplastics are plastic particles smaller than five millimeters. Some are made that small; others break off larger plastic items as they wear down. They’re in our water, food and environment—and researchers have reported them inside human bodies, including the brain, heart tissue, liver, placentas, testes and even newborns’ first stools. Even smaller plastic particles are called nanoplastics.

Research into what these particles do to human health is growing rapidly. Aelo Research follows the findings and explains them in plain English.

The findings reach far beyond plastic pollution. Scientists are reporting warning signs involving heart health, body fat, fertility, hormones, memory and hair loss:

• Heart health: an Italian study linked plastic particles in artery plaque with a higher risk of heart attack, stroke or death.
• Weight gain: mice given polystyrene microplastics in drinking water gained more weight and body fat.
• Fertility: human studies have found plastic in testes and semen, with some exposures linked to poorer sperm quality.
• Hormones and memory: experiments in mice have found lower testosterone and impaired learning and memory.
• Hair loss: a mouse study reported hair-follicle damage and hair loss after polystyrene microplastic exposure.

These are findings worth paying attention to. The evidence includes human associations and controlled animal experiments; researchers are still establishing which effects occur in people at everyday exposure levels.

From PubMed, the research database run by the U.S. National Library of Medicine. We counted papers whose title or abstract mentions microplastics and either humans or health, by the year they were published: 11 papers in 2015 and 1,739 in 2025, a 15,709% increase in the last decade.

We retrieved these counts on September 24, 2026. PubMed keeps adding papers as they are indexed, so the same search today can show a slightly higher count. The exact search is “microplastics[tiab] AND (human[tiab] OR health[tiab])”, counted by publication year.

Mice drinking water containing polystyrene microplastics gained more weight and accumulated more body fat than the comparison group in a 2024 study. The mice were eating a standard chow diet. Researchers described the particles as obesogenic—meaning they promoted weight gain and fat accumulation in that experiment.

Animal studies help researchers test cause and effect and investigate biological processes that humans share, including how we store fat. They provide important early evidence, but the exposure and results do not translate directly to people. Human studies have not yet established that microplastics cause obesity.

Researchers found microplastics in all 23 human testicle samples examined in a 2024 study. A separate study recruited 113 men attending fertility clinics and successfully measured microplastics in semen and urine from 100. More plastic types were associated with lower sperm concentration; the study did not establish cause.

Researchers are also studying female fertility. A 2025 study found microplastics in the fluid surrounding developing eggs in 14 of 18 women undergoing fertility treatment, although it found no link with fertilization outcomes, miscarriage or live birth. In another study of 51 couples undergoing IVF, higher levels of certain nanoplastics in that fluid were associated with lower fertilization rates, but not with embryo implantation or clinical pregnancy.

These findings put plastic exposure directly into the conversation about reproductive health. Animal experiments have also found damage to sperm and reproductive tissues. The human studies show concerning associations; they do not yet establish that microplastics cause infertility.

In lab mice, yes. Male mice that drank water with plastic particles in it for 180 days had lower testosterone than mice on clean water, along with poorer sperm quality.

No published study has measured microplastics and testosterone in men yet. The closest human evidence is semen: plastic turned up in 100 of 100 samples from men tested at fertility clinics in China, and men carrying more kinds of plastic were more likely to have a low sperm count. That is a link, not proof that the plastic caused it.

In a 2024 Italian study, patients with microplastics or nanoplastics in their neck-artery plaque had about 4.5 times the adjusted risk of a heart attack, stroke or death from any cause over nearly three years, compared with patients without detectable particles in their plaque.

The study followed 257 people after surgery for narrowed carotid arteries. It is a serious warning sign for heart health. Because it was observational, it establishes a link rather than proving the particles caused those events.

Experiments in mice have found that polystyrene microplastic exposure impaired learning and memory. Human research has also reported tiny plastic particles in brain tissue: a 2025 study found substantially higher concentrations in samples from people diagnosed with dementia than in samples from people without that diagnosis.

The combination makes brain health a pressing area of research. The human study does not establish that plastic caused dementia; the disease itself may make particles harder to clear. Researchers are working to understand how these particles reach the brain and what they do once they get there.

Yes—in animal experiments, microplastic exposure has disrupted hormones. In one study, mice given polystyrene microplastics in their drinking water for 180 days had lower testosterone and lower levels of two hormones that help control reproduction, alongside poorer sperm quality.

Hormones regulate everything from growth to reproduction, so these findings matter. They show a biological effect under the conditions tested; the size of any effect from everyday human exposure is still being studied.

Babies can be exposed from something as ordinary as a feeding bottle. A 2020 laboratory study reported particle release from polypropylene baby bottles during formula preparation. In a later reassessment, the same team reported substantially lower counts after distinguishing plastic from additives. The measured amount depends on the method and conditions.

These experiments measured particles released into water, not illness in babies. They do not establish that the tested bottles harmed children. Follow current health guidance for preparing formula and sterilizing bottles.

Yes. Invite two friends. When both join, we mail you an Aelo Straw Kit, free. One per household, U.S. only, while test kits last.

We’re making a limited number of test kits before launch. Two invites each keeps the test small.

Use the straw, then answer a few quick questions. Your answers shape the launch.

December 1, 2026.