2023-04-24 01:57:31
The amount of plastic waste that float on the surface of the Pacific are an unpleasant image … except for hundreds of species of seashells and anemones, who see there as a welcoming place and a good means of transportation, reveals a study published in Nature Ecology and Evolution.
Located in the northeast of the Pacific Ocean, and discovered in 1997, the “plastic continent”, also called the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch” (Great Pacific Garbage Patch, GPGP), is made up of an immense space of waste (bags, bottles , packaging, abandoned fishing nets and degraded microparticles) that agglutinate in various areas, under the effect of giant eddies formed by marine currents. Its total size is calculated at 1.6 million km2, that is, more than Perçu and Ecuador combined.
Study: harmful for some, opportunity for others
The floating garbage area has interested scientists for years, and some have already shown that it can be harmful to some species such as fish, turtles and even some marine mammals that are trapped there and sometimes suffocate. But for other organisms, these areas can become an opportunity, according to the new study.
The US researchers sampled debris in the Northeast Pacific, between California and Hawaii, and found 37 types of invertebrates originating mainly from countries like Japan, on the other side of the ocean.
More than two thirds of the objects examined contained coastal species, especially crustaceans, sea anemones and foams called bryozoans. These creatures can spread rapidly by feeding on layers of mucus formed by bacteria and algae. on plastics floating, the study shows.
In 2012, “inhabited” plastic debris was found off the North American coast, scattered by the 2011 tsunami in northeastern Japanese waters.
Invasive species?
A previous study carried out by the same team of researchers in 2021 had warned that these marine inhabitants, by integrating into new areas, can disturb the species that already lived there. To the point of becoming invasive? The question is still pertinent, Linsey Haram told AFP.
“These interactions” between old and new species “can include both forms of competition for food or territory, and even predation.” But further research is needed to understand whether the arrival of these settlers is “more or less positive or negative.”
“Plastic problems go beyond ingestion and entanglement,” Haram explained. “It is creating opportunities for the biogeography of coastal species to be greatly expanded beyond what we previously thought possible,” he added.
Invertebrates could ‘fundamentally alter’ marine ecosystems
Plastic in the oceans is disturbingly disrupting marine ecosystems, and the situation could worsen if coastal invertebrates venture out to sea aboard floating debris rafts, Haram and his colleagues warn. According to experts, this situation could “fundamentally alter” ocean communities.
If current trends in waste production and management continue, there could be 12 billion tons of plastic waste in landfills and in the natural environment by 2050.
The G7 energy and environment ministers, meeting this weekend in Japan, announced that they want to draw up an “international legally binding instrument on plastic pollution” by the end of 2024, with the “ambition to reduce pollution to zero.” additional plastic from now to 2040».
FEW (AFP, Science Alert, Nature Ecology and Evolution)
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