The Arctic Ocean as a dead end for floating plastics in the North Atlantic branch of the Thermohaline Circulation
International audience The subtropical ocean gyres are recognized as great marine accummulation zones of floating plastic debris; however, the possibility of plastic accumulation at polar latitudes has been overlooked because of the lack of nearby pollution sources. In the present study, the Arctic...
Published in: | Science Advances |
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Main Authors: | , , , , , , , , , , , |
Other Authors: | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , |
Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
Language: | English |
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HAL CCSD
2017
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Online Access: | https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920 https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920/document https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920/file/e1600582.full.pdf https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1600582 |
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Open Polar |
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Institut national des sciences de l'Univers: HAL-INSU |
op_collection_id |
ftinsu |
language |
English |
topic |
[SDE]Environmental Sciences |
spellingShingle |
[SDE]Environmental Sciences Cózar, Andrés Martí, Elisa, M Duarte, Carlos, M García-De-Lomas, Juan van Sebille, Erik Ballatore, J, J Eguíluz, Victor, M Ignacio González-Gordillo, J, J Pedrotti, Maria, L Echevarría, Fidel Troublè, Romain Irigoien, Xabier The Arctic Ocean as a dead end for floating plastics in the North Atlantic branch of the Thermohaline Circulation |
topic_facet |
[SDE]Environmental Sciences |
description |
International audience The subtropical ocean gyres are recognized as great marine accummulation zones of floating plastic debris; however, the possibility of plastic accumulation at polar latitudes has been overlooked because of the lack of nearby pollution sources. In the present study, the Arctic Ocean was extensively sampled for floating plastic debris from the Tara Oceans circumpolar expedition. Although plastic debris was scarce or absent in most of the Arctic waters, it reached high concentrations (hundreds of thousands of pieces per square kilometer) in the northernmost and easternmost areas of the Greenland and Barents seas. The fragmentation and typology of the plastic suggested an abundant presence of aged debris that originated from distant sources. This hypothesis was corroborated by the relatively high ratios of marine surface plastic to local pollution sources. Surface circulation models and field data showed that the poleward branch of the Thermohaline Circulation transfers floating debris from the North Atlantic to the Greenland and Barents seas, which would be a dead end for this plastic conveyor belt. Given the limited surface transport of the plastic that accumulated here and the mechanisms acting for the downward transport, the seafloor beneath this Arctic sector is hypothesized as an important sink of plastic debris. |
author2 |
Facultad de Ciencias del Mar y Ambientales Universidad de Cádiz = University of Cádiz (UCA) King Abdullah University of Science and Technology Saudi Arabia (KAUST) Arctic Research Centre Aarhus University Aarhus Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment Imperial College London Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research Utrecht (IMAU) Universiteit Utrecht / Utrecht University Utrecht Harvard University Lake Basin Action Network Instituto de Fisica Interdisciplinar y Sistemas Complejos (IFISC) CSIC-UIB-Universitat de les Illes Balears = Universidad de las Islas Baleares = University of the Balearic Islands (UIB) Laboratoire d'océanographie de Villefranche (LOV) Observatoire océanologique de Villefranche-sur-mer (OOVM) Université Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris 6 (UPMC)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris 6 (UPMC)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) Tara Expéditions AZTI-Tecnalia (Marine Research Division) AZTI-Tecnalia Ikerbasque - Basque Foundation for Science ANR-11-BTBR-0008,OCEANOMICS,Biotechnologies et bioressources pour la valorisation des écosystèmes marins planctoniques(2011) |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Cózar, Andrés Martí, Elisa, M Duarte, Carlos, M García-De-Lomas, Juan van Sebille, Erik Ballatore, J, J Eguíluz, Victor, M Ignacio González-Gordillo, J, J Pedrotti, Maria, L Echevarría, Fidel Troublè, Romain Irigoien, Xabier |
author_facet |
Cózar, Andrés Martí, Elisa, M Duarte, Carlos, M García-De-Lomas, Juan van Sebille, Erik Ballatore, J, J Eguíluz, Victor, M Ignacio González-Gordillo, J, J Pedrotti, Maria, L Echevarría, Fidel Troublè, Romain Irigoien, Xabier |
author_sort |
Cózar, Andrés |
title |
The Arctic Ocean as a dead end for floating plastics in the North Atlantic branch of the Thermohaline Circulation |
title_short |
The Arctic Ocean as a dead end for floating plastics in the North Atlantic branch of the Thermohaline Circulation |
title_full |
The Arctic Ocean as a dead end for floating plastics in the North Atlantic branch of the Thermohaline Circulation |
title_fullStr |
The Arctic Ocean as a dead end for floating plastics in the North Atlantic branch of the Thermohaline Circulation |
title_full_unstemmed |
The Arctic Ocean as a dead end for floating plastics in the North Atlantic branch of the Thermohaline Circulation |
title_sort |
arctic ocean as a dead end for floating plastics in the north atlantic branch of the thermohaline circulation |
publisher |
HAL CCSD |
publishDate |
2017 |
url |
https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920 https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920/document https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920/file/e1600582.full.pdf https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1600582 |
genre |
Arctic Arctic Ocean Greenland North Atlantic |
genre_facet |
Arctic Arctic Ocean Greenland North Atlantic |
op_source |
ISSN: 2375-2548 Science Advances https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920 Science Advances , 2017, 3 (4), pp.e1600582. ⟨10.1126/sciadv.1600582⟩ |
op_relation |
info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.1126/sciadv.1600582 hal-01512920 https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920 https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920/document https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920/file/e1600582.full.pdf doi:10.1126/sciadv.1600582 |
op_rights |
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/ info:eu-repo/semantics/OpenAccess |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1600582 |
container_title |
Science Advances |
container_volume |
3 |
container_issue |
4 |
container_start_page |
e1600582 |
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1797576574985306112 |
spelling |
ftinsu:oai:HAL:hal-01512920v1 2024-04-28T08:07:27+00:00 The Arctic Ocean as a dead end for floating plastics in the North Atlantic branch of the Thermohaline Circulation Cózar, Andrés Martí, Elisa, M Duarte, Carlos, M García-De-Lomas, Juan van Sebille, Erik Ballatore, J, J Eguíluz, Victor, M Ignacio González-Gordillo, J, J Pedrotti, Maria, L Echevarría, Fidel Troublè, Romain Irigoien, Xabier Facultad de Ciencias del Mar y Ambientales Universidad de Cádiz = University of Cádiz (UCA) King Abdullah University of Science and Technology Saudi Arabia (KAUST) Arctic Research Centre Aarhus University Aarhus Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment Imperial College London Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research Utrecht (IMAU) Universiteit Utrecht / Utrecht University Utrecht Harvard University Lake Basin Action Network Instituto de Fisica Interdisciplinar y Sistemas Complejos (IFISC) CSIC-UIB-Universitat de les Illes Balears = Universidad de las Islas Baleares = University of the Balearic Islands (UIB) Laboratoire d'océanographie de Villefranche (LOV) Observatoire océanologique de Villefranche-sur-mer (OOVM) Université Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris 6 (UPMC)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris 6 (UPMC)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) Tara Expéditions AZTI-Tecnalia (Marine Research Division) AZTI-Tecnalia Ikerbasque - Basque Foundation for Science ANR-11-BTBR-0008,OCEANOMICS,Biotechnologies et bioressources pour la valorisation des écosystèmes marins planctoniques(2011) 2017 https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920 https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920/document https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920/file/e1600582.full.pdf https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1600582 en eng HAL CCSD American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.1126/sciadv.1600582 hal-01512920 https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920 https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920/document https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920/file/e1600582.full.pdf doi:10.1126/sciadv.1600582 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/ info:eu-repo/semantics/OpenAccess ISSN: 2375-2548 Science Advances https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-01512920 Science Advances , 2017, 3 (4), pp.e1600582. ⟨10.1126/sciadv.1600582⟩ [SDE]Environmental Sciences info:eu-repo/semantics/article Journal articles 2017 ftinsu https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1600582 2024-04-05T00:47:53Z International audience The subtropical ocean gyres are recognized as great marine accummulation zones of floating plastic debris; however, the possibility of plastic accumulation at polar latitudes has been overlooked because of the lack of nearby pollution sources. In the present study, the Arctic Ocean was extensively sampled for floating plastic debris from the Tara Oceans circumpolar expedition. Although plastic debris was scarce or absent in most of the Arctic waters, it reached high concentrations (hundreds of thousands of pieces per square kilometer) in the northernmost and easternmost areas of the Greenland and Barents seas. The fragmentation and typology of the plastic suggested an abundant presence of aged debris that originated from distant sources. This hypothesis was corroborated by the relatively high ratios of marine surface plastic to local pollution sources. Surface circulation models and field data showed that the poleward branch of the Thermohaline Circulation transfers floating debris from the North Atlantic to the Greenland and Barents seas, which would be a dead end for this plastic conveyor belt. Given the limited surface transport of the plastic that accumulated here and the mechanisms acting for the downward transport, the seafloor beneath this Arctic sector is hypothesized as an important sink of plastic debris. Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic Arctic Ocean Greenland North Atlantic Institut national des sciences de l'Univers: HAL-INSU Science Advances 3 4 e1600582 |