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In search for the sources of plastic marine litter that contaminates the Easter Island Ecoregion

Subtropical gyres are the oceanic regions where plastic litter accumulates over long timescales, exposing surrounding oceanic islands to plastic contamination, with potentially severe consequences on marine life. Islands’ exposure to such contaminants, littered over long distances in marine or terre...

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Autores principales: Gennip, Simon Jan van, Dewitte, Boris, Garçon, Véronique, Thiel, Martin, Popova, Ekaterina, Drillet, Yann, Ramos, Marcel, Yannicelli, Beatriz, Bravo, Luis, Ory, Nicolas, Luna-Jorquera, Guillermo, Gaymer, Carlos F.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Nature Publishing Group UK 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6927966/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31873122
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-56012-x
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author Gennip, Simon Jan van
Dewitte, Boris
Garçon, Véronique
Thiel, Martin
Popova, Ekaterina
Drillet, Yann
Ramos, Marcel
Yannicelli, Beatriz
Bravo, Luis
Ory, Nicolas
Luna-Jorquera, Guillermo
Gaymer, Carlos F.
author_facet Gennip, Simon Jan van
Dewitte, Boris
Garçon, Véronique
Thiel, Martin
Popova, Ekaterina
Drillet, Yann
Ramos, Marcel
Yannicelli, Beatriz
Bravo, Luis
Ory, Nicolas
Luna-Jorquera, Guillermo
Gaymer, Carlos F.
author_sort Gennip, Simon Jan van
collection PubMed
description Subtropical gyres are the oceanic regions where plastic litter accumulates over long timescales, exposing surrounding oceanic islands to plastic contamination, with potentially severe consequences on marine life. Islands’ exposure to such contaminants, littered over long distances in marine or terrestrial habitats, is due to the ocean currents that can transport plastic over long ranges. Here, this issue is addressed for the Easter Island ecoregion (EIE). High-resolution ocean circulation models are used with a Lagrangian particle-tracking tool to identify the connectivity patterns of the EIE with industrial fishing areas and coastline regions of the Pacific basin. Connectivity patterns for “virtual” particles either floating (such as buoyant macroplastics) or neutrally-buoyant (smaller microplastics) are investigated. We find that the South American shoreline between 20°S and 40°S, and the fishing zone within international waters off Peru (20°S, 80°W) are associated with the highest probability for debris to reach the EIE, with transit times under 2 years. These regions coincide with the most-densely populated coastal region of Chile and the most-intensely fished region in the South Pacific. The findings offer potential for mitigating plastic contamination reaching the EIE through better upstream waste management. Results also highlight the need for international action plans on this important issue.
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spelling pubmed-69279662019-12-27 In search for the sources of plastic marine litter that contaminates the Easter Island Ecoregion Gennip, Simon Jan van Dewitte, Boris Garçon, Véronique Thiel, Martin Popova, Ekaterina Drillet, Yann Ramos, Marcel Yannicelli, Beatriz Bravo, Luis Ory, Nicolas Luna-Jorquera, Guillermo Gaymer, Carlos F. Sci Rep Article Subtropical gyres are the oceanic regions where plastic litter accumulates over long timescales, exposing surrounding oceanic islands to plastic contamination, with potentially severe consequences on marine life. Islands’ exposure to such contaminants, littered over long distances in marine or terrestrial habitats, is due to the ocean currents that can transport plastic over long ranges. Here, this issue is addressed for the Easter Island ecoregion (EIE). High-resolution ocean circulation models are used with a Lagrangian particle-tracking tool to identify the connectivity patterns of the EIE with industrial fishing areas and coastline regions of the Pacific basin. Connectivity patterns for “virtual” particles either floating (such as buoyant macroplastics) or neutrally-buoyant (smaller microplastics) are investigated. We find that the South American shoreline between 20°S and 40°S, and the fishing zone within international waters off Peru (20°S, 80°W) are associated with the highest probability for debris to reach the EIE, with transit times under 2 years. These regions coincide with the most-densely populated coastal region of Chile and the most-intensely fished region in the South Pacific. The findings offer potential for mitigating plastic contamination reaching the EIE through better upstream waste management. Results also highlight the need for international action plans on this important issue. Nature Publishing Group UK 2019-12-23 /pmc/articles/PMC6927966/ /pubmed/31873122 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-56012-x Text en © The Author(s) 2019 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
spellingShingle Article
Gennip, Simon Jan van
Dewitte, Boris
Garçon, Véronique
Thiel, Martin
Popova, Ekaterina
Drillet, Yann
Ramos, Marcel
Yannicelli, Beatriz
Bravo, Luis
Ory, Nicolas
Luna-Jorquera, Guillermo
Gaymer, Carlos F.
In search for the sources of plastic marine litter that contaminates the Easter Island Ecoregion
title In search for the sources of plastic marine litter that contaminates the Easter Island Ecoregion
title_full In search for the sources of plastic marine litter that contaminates the Easter Island Ecoregion
title_fullStr In search for the sources of plastic marine litter that contaminates the Easter Island Ecoregion
title_full_unstemmed In search for the sources of plastic marine litter that contaminates the Easter Island Ecoregion
title_short In search for the sources of plastic marine litter that contaminates the Easter Island Ecoregion
title_sort in search for the sources of plastic marine litter that contaminates the easter island ecoregion
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6927966/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31873122
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-56012-x
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