Microplastics in sea coastal zone: Lessons learned from the Baltic amber

Chubarenko, Irina; Stepanova, Natalia

doi:10.1016/j.envpol.2017.01.085

Cited by 100 publications

(47 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…This plays a role in the coastal zone, where waves steepen and ultimately break (see section 4.11), and during storms, when waves rapidly steepen and the Stokes drift rapidly increases. This change is crucial for plastic debris beaching: developing steep stormy waves may 'grab' plastics and sediments from the beach, and transport these offshore; whilst smoother waves, which remain after the wind ceases, slowly return plastics and sediments back to shore (Chubarenko and Stepanova 2017).…”

Section: Open Ocean Stokes Driftmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Song et al 2017) and fragmentation in the sea swash and wave breaking zone, especially during storm events(Chubarenko and Stepanova 2017, Chubarenko et al 2018, Efimova et al 2018. The fragmentation rate of beached plastic might be closely related to the residence time on beaches Hinata 2015, Fanini and Bozzeda 2018) and is dependent on polymer type(Song et al 2017) and temperature (Andrady 2011).…”

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confidence: 99%

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The physical oceanography of the transport of floating marine debris

Sebille

Aliani

Law

et al. 2020

Environ. Res. Lett.

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Marine plastic debris floating on the ocean surface is a major environmental problem. However, its distribution in the ocean is poorly mapped, and most of the plastic waste estimated to have entered the ocean from land is unaccounted for. Better understanding of how plastic debris is transported from coastal and marine sources is crucial to quantify and close the global inventory of marine plastics, which in turn represents critical information for mitigation or policy strategies. At the same time, plastic is a unique tracer that provides an opportunity to learn more about the physics and dynamics of our ocean across multiple scales, from the Ekman convergence in basin-scale gyres to individual waves in the surfzone. In this review, we comprehensively discuss what is known about the different processes that govern the transport of floating marine plastic debris in both the open ocean and the coastal zones, based on the published literature and referring to insights from neighbouring fields such as oil spill dispersion, marine safety recovery, plankton connectivity, and others. We discuss how measurements of marine plastics (both in situ and in the laboratory), remote sensing, and numerical simulations can elucidate these processes and their interactions across spatio-temporal scales. Environ. Res. Lett. 15 (2020) 023003 E van Sebille et al Environ. Res. Lett. 15 (2020) 023003 E van Sebille et al References Acha E M, Mianzan H W, Iribarne O, Gagliardini D A, Lasta C and Daleo P 2003 The role of the Rı́o de la Plata bottom salinity front in accumulating debris Mar. Pollut. Bull. 46 197-202 Acha E M, Piola A, Iribarne O and Mianzan H 2015 Ecological Processes at Marine Fronts: Oases in the Ocean (Berlin: Springer) Aliani S and Molcard A 2003 Hitch-hiking on floating marine debris: macrobenthic species in the Western Mediterranean Sea Hydrobiologia 503 59-67 Allen J 1985 Principles of Physical Sedimentology (Berlin: Springer) Alpers W 1985 Theory of radar imaging of internal waves Nature 314 245-7 Alsina J M and Cáceres I 2011 Sediment suspension events in the inner surf and swash zone. Measurements in large-scale and high-energy wave conditions Coast. Eng. 58

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Section: Open Ocean Stokes Driftmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

The physical oceanography of the transport of floating marine debris

Sebille

Aliani

Law

et al. 2020

Environ. Res. Lett.

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608

267

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“…As for today's knowledge, plastics are not biodegraded to considerable extent under environmental (especially marine) conditions (Andrady, 2011;Duis and Coors, 2016), and mineralisation of plastics appears to be extremely slow as well (Shah et al, 2008;Andrady, 2011). In the sea, however, new mechanisms appear (Shah et al, 2008;Chubarenko et al, 2016), most effective being mechanical abrasion by sediments and fragmentation in the sea swash and wave breaking zone, especially during stormy events (Chubarenko and Stepanova, 2017;Chubarenko et al, 2018;Efimova and Chubarenko, 2018). Here, properties and qualities of the generated MP particles are very difficult to predict, which does not make this question less important.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Secondary Microplastics Generation in the Sea Swash Zone With Coarse Bottom Sediments: Laboratory Experiments

et al. 2018

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Marine beaches worldwide are nowadays exposed to significant contamination by plastics. On the Baltic beaches, polyethylene, polypropylene, and polystyrene are most abundant. We investigate the generation of microplastics particles (MPs, characteristic size from 0.5 to 5 mm) from larger plastic items in the sea swash zone using a laboratory rotating mixer filled with water and natural coarse beach sediment (marine pebbles). Inclination of the axis of rotation and the volume of the material were adjusted in such a way that mixing resembled a breaking wave in the swash zone. Plastic samples used were of the types most commonly found on the sea beaches. Experimental 2 × 2 cm-large plastic items made of low-density polyethylene (LDPE) were manufactured from common new garbage bags (thickness 5 µm); those made of polypropylene (PP) and polystyrene (PS) were produced from single-use tableware; samples of foamed plastics were presented by cubes (with 2-cm sides) cut out of standard building insulator sheets (foamed PS). Four sets of 24-h-long experiments were conducted (for each type of plastic separately), with step-wise (every 3 h) examination of the generated MPs mass, number of particles, and their qualitative characteristics such as shape, quality of the surface, general behavior while mixing, etc. Statistically significant dependencies are obtained for the increase in mass and in number of MPs with time for all four used kinds of plastics. Brittle solid PS is shown to be the most productive in terms of both mass and number of MPs generated. Anisotropic springing PP is the most resistant. Tensile tearing of LDPE and fragmentation of foamed PS to compounding bubbles/spherules show the variety of mechanisms involved in fragmentation of plastics in the swash zone. Increase in MPs mass and the number of MPs particles with time, as well the link between them, are important for field monitoring and numerical modeling. Potentially shape-selective operation of sieves during sampling and sorting of MPs particles of various shapes is discussed.

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“…Fragments of harder plastics (FRAG) and industrial pellets (IND) making up the majority of the microplastic particles. These differences in migration, breakdown and deposition of different microplastic types may be explained by the re-suspension of sediments; the nature of fragments and rounded pellets behaving in a different way to films, flakes and fibres (Chubarenko and Stepanova, 2017). Indeed modelling of microplastics in the marine environment has revealed that foamed plastics travel fastest over surface water and films and fibres typically sink due to higher rates of bio-fouling than fragments or spheres which could explain their lack of abundance upon beaches (Chubarenko et al, 2016).…”

Section: Variance Among Plastic Categoriesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The true depth of the Mediterranean plastic problem: Extreme microplastic pollution on marine turtle nesting beaches in Cyprus

Duncan

Arrowsmith

Bain

et al. 2018

Marine Pollution Bulletin

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A B S T R A C TWe sampled 17 nesting sites for loggerhead (Caretta caretta) and green turtles (Chelonia mydas) in Cyprus. Microplastics (< 5 mm) were found at all locations and depths, with particularly high abundance in superficial sand. The top 2 cm of sand presented grand mean ± SD particle counts of 45,497 ± 11,456 particles m −3 (range 637-131,939 particles m −3 ). The most polluted beaches were among the worst thus far recorded, presenting levels approaching those previously recorded in Guangdong, South China. Microplastics decreased with increasing sand depth but were present down to turtle nest depths of 60 cm (mean 5,325 ± 3,663 particles m −3 . Composition varied among beaches but hard fragments (46.5 ± 3.5%) and pre-production nurdles (47.8 ± 4.5%) comprised most categorised pieces. Particle drifter analysis hindcast for 365 days indicated that most plastic likely originated from the eastern Mediterranean basin. Worsening microplastic abundance could result in anthropogenically altered life history parameters such as hatching success and sex ratios in marine turtles.

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Microplastics in sea coastal zone: Lessons learned from the Baltic amber

Cited by 100 publications

References 26 publications

The physical oceanography of the transport of floating marine debris

The physical oceanography of the transport of floating marine debris

Secondary Microplastics Generation in the Sea Swash Zone With Coarse Bottom Sediments: Laboratory Experiments

The true depth of the Mediterranean plastic problem: Extreme microplastic pollution on marine turtle nesting beaches in Cyprus

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