Plastic debris in the open ocean
Andrés Cózar,Fidel Echevarría,J. Ignacio González-Gordillo,Xabier Irigoien,Bárbara Úbeda,Santiago Hernández-León,Alvaro T. Palma,Sandra Navarro,Juan García-de-Lomas,Andrea Ruiz,María L. Fernández-de-Puelles,Carlos M. Duarte +11 more
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TLDR
Using data from the Malaspina 2010 circumnavigation, regional surveys, and previously published reports, this work shows a worldwide distribution of plastic on the surface of the open ocean, mostly accumulating in the convergence zones of each of the five subtropical gyres with comparable density.Abstract:
There is a rising concern regarding the accumulation of floating plastic debris in the open ocean. However, the magnitude and the fate of this pollution are still open questions. Using data from the Malaspina 2010 circumnavigation, regional surveys, and previously published reports, we show a worldwide distribution of plastic on the surface of the open ocean, mostly accumulating in the convergence zones of each of the five subtropical gyres with comparable density. However, the global load of plastic on the open ocean surface was estimated to be on the order of tens of thousands of tons, far less than expected. Our observations of the size distribution of floating plastic debris point at important size-selective sinks removing millimeter-sized fragments of floating plastic on a large scale. This sink may involve a combination of fast nano-fragmentation of the microplastic into particles of microns or smaller, their transference to the ocean interior by food webs and ballasting processes, and processes yet to be discovered. Resolving the fate of the missing plastic debris is of fundamental importance to determine the nature and significance of the impacts of plastic pollution in the ocean.read more
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Effect of land use on microplastic pollution in a major boundary waterway: The Arvand River.
Naghmeh Soltani,Behnam Keshavarzi,Farid Moore,Rosa Busquets,Mohammadreza Nematollahi,Reza Javid,Sylvie Gobert +6 more
TL;DR: In this article , the occurrence of microplastics (MPs) in the Arvand River (Iran) was investigated in 24 stations located along the river and MP pollution levels ranged between 1 and 291 items·L-1 and 70 to 15,620 items·kg-1 (dw), in water and sediment, respectively.
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Study on the microplastics release from fishing nets
Alessio Montarsolo,Raffaella Mossotti,Alessia Patrucco,Rosalinda Caringella,Marina Zoccola,Pier Davide Pozzo,Claudio Tonin +6 more
TL;DR: In this article, the authors estimate that 10% of total plastic waste ends up in the oceans and have reached even remote areas such as polar region, depending on the chemical composition of plastic polymers, these wastes can accumulate on the seabed or remain suspended in the water column.
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Microplastic pollution in the Yangtze River Basin: Heterogeneity of abundances and characteristics in different environments.
TL;DR: Zhang et al. as discussed by the authors found that the microplastic size and abundance distribution in river water and lake and reservoir water showed different patterns for different sampling methods, indicating that different methods influenced the results.
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Physical interactions between marine phytoplankton and PET plastics in seawater
Silvia Casabianca,Samuela Capellacci,Antonella Penna,Michela Cangiotti,Alberto Fattori,Ilaria Corsi,Maria Francesca Ottaviani,Riccardo Carloni +7 more
TL;DR: A computer-aided analysis of electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) spectra of selected spin probes able to enter the phyoplanktonic cell interface and interact with the plastic surface showed a significant difference in terms of surface properties between the diatom and dinoflagellate species.
References
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