Global review of shark and ray entanglement in anthropogenic marine debris

Parton, Kristian J.; Galloway, Tamara S.; Godley, Brendan J.

doi:10.3354/esr00964

Cited by 81 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 116 publications

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“…Microplastic ingestion in elasmobranchs. Elasmobranchs are relatively understudied in regards to threats from plastic pollution 32,33 , nonetheless their susceptibility to microplastic ingestion has been reported in a handful of scientific publications 22,[34][35][36][37][38][39] . It is thought that some species of elasmobranch may be at higher risk of microplastic ingestion based on their feeding strategies or habitat use 35 .…”

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confidence: 99%

Investigating the presence of microplastics in demersal sharks of the North-East Atlantic

Parton

Godley

Santillo

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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Microplastic pollution is ubiquitous in the marine environment and is ingested by numerous marine species. Sharks are an understudied group regarding their susceptibility to microplastic ingestion. Here, we provide evidence of ingestion of microplastic and other anthropogenic fibres in four demersal sharks species found in the waters of the United Kingdom and investigate whether body burdens of contamination vary according to species, sex or size. Sharks were collected from the northEast Atlantic. Stomachs and digestive tracts of 46 sharks of 4 species were examined and 67% of samples contained at least one contaminant particle. Although we acknowledge modest sample size, estimated particle burden increased with body size but did not vary systematically with sex or species. A total of 379 particles were identified, leading to median estimates ranging from 2 to 7.5 ingested contaminants per animal for the 4 species. The majority were fibrous in nature (95%) and blue (88%) or black (9%) in colour. A subsample of contaminants (N = 62) were subject to FT-IR spectroscopy and polymers identified as: synthetic cellulose (33.3%), polypropylene (25%), polyacrylamides (10%) and polyester (8.3%). The level of risk posed to shark species by this level of contamination is unknown. Nevertheless, this study presents the first empirical evidence and an important baseline for ingestion of microplastics and other anthropogenic fibres in native UK shark species and highlights the pervasive nature of these pollutants. plastics in the marine environment. Research on plastic in the marine environment has accelerated rapidly in the last decade, with numerous publications describing its impact on ecosystems and marine taxa 1-7. It is estimated that between 4.8 and 12.7 million tonnes of plastic enter the oceans every year from a variety of sources 6. Plastic is a popular material due to its durability, low production cost and efficiency in its uses 8. It is these properties, alongside its often disposable nature that leads to its prevalence in the environment for many years 9. Microplastics (defined as plastic particles < 5 mm) 10 are ubiquitous in the marine environment 11-13. Despite this knowledge, quantitative assessments of their abundance are still fairly limited 14 , although some estimates place their abundance at 5.25 trillion particles globally, weighing in at over 250,000 tonnes 5. Microplastics, in the form of fibres, fragments or beads/spheres, assimilate in the marine ecosystem via multiple avenues. Larger pieces of plastic can disintegrate over time due to UV radiation exposure, wave action and physical abrasion, eventually fragmenting into microscopic particles 15. Microplastics are also found in many everyday items used by humans including cosmetic products and can be produced by clothing wear 16-19. These can then reach the oceans via wastewater treatment plants 20. ingestion of microplastics in marine species. Ingestion of microplastics is reported in many marine species including turtles, marine mammals and fish 1,21...

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confidence: 99%

Investigating the presence of microplastics in demersal sharks of the North-East Atlantic

Parton

Godley

Santillo

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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“…Tapping into these surveys can reduce environmental disturbance from conducting duplicate surveys (Jones, 2009). To address major knowledge gaps and conservation challenges, it has been suggested recently to take advantage of ever-increasing supply of publicly available, open-source data on social media platforms to supplement conventional research protocols (Klemann-Junior et al, 2017;McKinley et al, 2017;Mancini et al, 2019;Pace et al, 2019;Parton et al, 2019). This has been demonstrated to be a reliable tool for obtaining cetacean-distribution data (Hann et al, 2018;Pace et al, 2019); therefore, collecting ROV data from international public-domain platforms can aid research purposes on a global scale.…”

Section: Diving To New Depthsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Underwater Visual Records of Marine Megafauna Around Offshore Anthropogenic Structures

Todd

Lazar²,

Williamson

et al. 2020

Front. Mar. Sci.

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“…While our knowledge of ocean plastics is far from complete, the best available predictions suggest that with increasing mismanagement of fossil fuel-derived plastics (FFP) (Lebreton and Andrady, 2019) there will be one tonne of ocean plastic for every three tonnes of fish by 2025 (Ellen MacArthur Foundation, 2017), the equivalent of 600 plastic bags for every ten-kilogram fish. The most visible impact of marine plastic pollution is its harm to marine megafauna (Galgani et al, 2019) including turtles (Lynch, 2018;Wilcox et al, 2018), mammals (Panti et al, 2019), birds (Wilcox et al, 2015) and sharks (Parton et al, 2019), which ingest and become entangled in FFP with fatal consequences (Stelfox et al, 2016;Provencher et al, 2017). Millions of marine animals of at least 260 species die annually due to interactions with FFP (Moore, 2008;Thompson et al, 2009;Claro et al, 2019).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Eliminating Plastic Pollution: How a Voluntary Contribution From Industry Will Drive the Circular Plastics Economy

et al. 2019

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Marine plastic pollution is a symptom of an inherently wasteful linear plastic economy, costing us more than US$ 2.2 trillion per year. Of the 6.3 billion tonnes of fossil fuel-derived plastic (FFP) waste produced to date, only 9% has been recycled; the rest being incinerated (12%) or dumped into the environment (79%). FFPs take centuries to degrade, meaning five billion tonnes of increasingly fragmented and dangerous plastics have accumulated in our oceans, soil and air. Rates of FFP production and waste are growing rapidly, driven by increased demand and shifting strategies of oil and gas companies responding to slowing profit growth. Without effective recycling, the harm caused by FFP waste will keep increasing, jeopardizing first marine life and ultimately humankind. In this Perspective article, we review the global costs of plastic pollution and explain why solving this is imperative for humanity's well-being. We show that FFP pollution is far beyond a marine environmental issue: it now invades our bodies, causing disease and dysfunction, while millions of adults and children work in conditions akin to slavery, picking through our waste. We argue that an integrated economic and technical solution, catalyzed through a voluntary industry-led contribution from new FFP production, is central to arrest plastic waste flows by making used plastic a cashable commodity, incentivizing recovery and accelerating industrialization of polymerto-polymer technologies. Without much-needed systematic transformation, driven by a contribution from FFP production, humanity and the oceans face a troubling future.

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Global review of shark and ray entanglement in anthropogenic marine debris

Cited by 81 publications

References 116 publications

Investigating the presence of microplastics in demersal sharks of the North-East Atlantic

Investigating the presence of microplastics in demersal sharks of the North-East Atlantic

Underwater Visual Records of Marine Megafauna Around Offshore Anthropogenic Structures

Eliminating Plastic Pollution: How a Voluntary Contribution From Industry Will Drive the Circular Plastics Economy

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