Microplastic pollution has become a serious ecological challenge. And researchers at N.C. State think the microplastics themselves might be the key to the cleanup. Researchers at the university were recently awarded a $2 million, four-year grant from the National Science Foundation’s Emerging Frontiers in Research and Innovation program to create a system to clean up microplastics in the oceans. "The removal of the [microplastics] that pervade the Earth's oceans and waterways, and their conversion…