By EurekAlert
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Scientists have just completed an unprecedented journey into the
vast and little-explored "Great Pacific Ocean Garbage Patch."
On the Scripps Environmental Accumulation of Plastic Expedition
(SEAPLEX), researchers got the first detailed view of plastic
debris floating in a remote ocean region.
It wasn't a pretty sight.
The Scripps research vessel (R/V) New Horizon left its San Diego
homeport on August 2, 2009, for the North Pacific Ocean Gyre,
located some 1,000 miles off California's coast, and returned on
August 21, 2009.
Scientists surveyed plastic distribution and abundance, taking
samples for analysis in the lab and assessing the impacts of debris
on marine life.
Before this research, little was known about the size of the
"garbage patch" and the threats it poses to marine life and the
gyre's biological environment.
The expedition was led by a team of Scripps Institution of
Oceanography (SIO) graduate students, with support from University
of California Ship Funds, the National Science Foundation (NSF) and
Project Kaisei.
"SEAPLEX was an important education experience for the graduate
students, and contributed to a better understanding of an important
problem in the oceans," said Linda Goad, program director in NSF's
Division of Ocean Sciences. "We hope that SEAPLEX will result in
increased awareness of a growing issue."
After transiting for six days aboard the research vessel, the
researchers reached their first intensive sampling site on August
9th.
Team members began 24-hour sampling periods using a variety of
tow nets to collect debris at several ocean depths.
"We targeted the highest plastic-containing areas so we could
begin to understand the scope of the problem," said Miriam
Goldstein of SIO, chief scientist of the expedition. "We also
studied everything from phytoplankton to zooplankton to small
midwater fish."
The scientists found that at numerous areas in the gyre, flecks
of plastic were abundant and easily spotted against the deep blue
seawater.
Among the assortment of items retrieved were plastic bottles
with a variety of biological inhabitants. The scientists also
collected jellyfish called by-the-wind sailors (Velella
velella).
On August 11th, the researchers encountered a large net entwined
with plastic and various marine organisms; they also recovered
several plastic bottles covered with ocean animals, including large
barnacles.
The next day, Pete Davison, an SIO graduate student studying
mid-water fish, collected several species in the gyre, including
the pearleye (Benthalbella dentata), a predatory fish with eyes
that look upward so it can see prey swimming above, and lanternfish
(Tarletonbeania crenularis), which migrate from as deep as 700
meters down to the ocean surface each day.
By the end of the expedition, the researchers were intrigued by
the gyre, but had seen their fill of its trash.
"Finding so much plastic there was shocking," said Goldstein.
"How could there be this much plastic floating in a random patch of
ocean--a thousand miles from land?"
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