Publication Date:
2022-05-26
Description:
Author Posting. © American Chemical Society, 2014. This article is posted here by permission of American Chemical Society for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Environmental Science and Technology 38 (2014): 4732–4738, doi:10.1021/es4053076.
Description:
We present an extensive survey of floating plastic debris in the eastern North and South Pacific Oceans from more than 2500 plankton net tows conducted between 2001 and 2012. From these data we defined an accumulation zone (25 to 41°N, 130 to 180°W) in the North Pacific subtropical gyre that closely corresponds to centers of accumulation resulting from the convergence of ocean surface currents predicted by several oceanographic numerical models. Maximum plastic concentrations from individual surface net tows exceeded 106 pieces km–2, with concentrations decreasing with increasing distance from the predicted center of accumulation. Outside the North Pacific subtropical gyre the median plastic concentration was 0 pieces km–2. We were unable to detect a robust temporal trend in the data set, perhaps because of confounded spatial and temporal variability. Large spatiotemporal variability in plastic concentration causes order of magnitude differences in summary statistics calculated over short time periods or in limited geographic areas. Utilizing all available plankton net data collected in the eastern Pacific Ocean (17.4°S to 61.0°N; 85.0 to 180.0°W) since 1999, we estimated a minimum of 21 290 t of floating microplastic.
Description:
This work was
supported by Sea Education Association, NFWF-NOAA Marine
Debris Program (Nos. 2009-0062-002, NA10OAR4320148,
Amend. 71), and NSF (Nos. OCE-0087528, OCE-1155379,
OCE-1260403, OCE-1352422).
Repository Name:
Woods Hole Open Access Server
Type:
Article
Format:
video/avi
Format:
application/pdf
