TY - JOUR
T1 - Airborne microplastic particles detected in the remote marine atmosphere
AU - Trainic, Miri
AU - Flores, J. Michel
AU - Pinkas, Iddo
AU - Pedrotti, Maria Luiza
AU - Lombard, Fabien
AU - Bourdin, Guillaume
AU - Gorsky, Gabriel
AU - Boss, Emmanuel
AU - Rudich, Yinon
AU - Vardi, Assaf
AU - Koren, Ilan
N1 - This research was supported by a research grant from Scott Jordan and Gina Valdez, the De Botton for Marine Science, the Yeda-Sela center for Basic research, and a research grant from the Yotam Project. Special thanks to the Tara Ocean Foundation, the R/V Tara crew and the Tara Pacific Expedition Participants (https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3777760). We are keen to thank the commitment of the following institutions for their financial and scientific support that made this unique Tara Pacific Expedition possible: CNRS, PSL, CSM, EPHE, Genoscope, CEA, Inserm, Université Côte d’Azur, ANR, agnès b., UNESCO-IOC, the Veolia Foundation, the Prince Albert II de Monaco Foundation, Région Bretagne, Billerudkorsnas, AmerisourceBergen Company, Lorient Agglomération, Oceans by Disney, L’Oréal, Biotherm, France Collectivités, Fonds Français pour l’Environnement Mondial (FFEM), Etienne Bourgois, and the Tara Ocean Foundation teams. Tara Pacific would not exist without the continuous support of the participating institutes. The authors also particularly thank Serge Planes, Denis Allemand, and the Tara Pacific consortium. This study has been conducted using E.U. Copernicus Marine Service Information and Mercator Ocean products. This is publication number # 12 of the Tara Pacific Consortium. The authors gratefully acknowledge the NOAA Air Resources Laboratory (ARL) for the provision of the HYSPLIT transport and dispersion model and/or READY website (http://www.ready.noaa.gov) used in this publication. Contributions I.K. and A.V. conceived the basic idea and supervised the project. M.T. and J.M.F. conceived, designed and set up the experiment. J.M.F. and G.B. collected the samples. M.T. and I.P. performed Raman analysis and interpreted the data. M.L.P. and F.L. sampled the seawater. G.G. was chief scientist onboard the Tara. G.G., E.B., and Y.R. contributed to data interpretation and writing. M.T., I.K., and A.V. wrote the paper.
PY - 2020/12/18
Y1 - 2020/12/18
N2 - Anthropogenic pollution from marine microplastic particles is a growing concern, both as a source of toxic compounds, and because they can transport pathogens and other pollutants. Airborne microplastic particles were previously observed over terrestrial and coastal locations, but not in the remote ocean. Here, we collected ambient aerosol samples in the North Atlantic Ocean, including the remote marine atmosphere, during the Tara Pacific expedition in May-June 2016, and chemically characterized them using micro-Raman spectroscopy. We detected a range of airborne microplastics, including polystyrene, polyethylene, polypropylene, and poly-silicone compounds. Polyethylene and polypropylene were also found in seawater, suggesting local production of airborne microplastic particles. Terminal velocity estimations and back trajectory analysis support this conclusion. For technical reasons, only particles larger than 5 µm, at the upper end of a typical marine atmospheric size distribution, were analyzed, suggesting that our analyses underestimate the presence of airborne microplastic particles in the remote marine atmosphere.
AB - Anthropogenic pollution from marine microplastic particles is a growing concern, both as a source of toxic compounds, and because they can transport pathogens and other pollutants. Airborne microplastic particles were previously observed over terrestrial and coastal locations, but not in the remote ocean. Here, we collected ambient aerosol samples in the North Atlantic Ocean, including the remote marine atmosphere, during the Tara Pacific expedition in May-June 2016, and chemically characterized them using micro-Raman spectroscopy. We detected a range of airborne microplastics, including polystyrene, polyethylene, polypropylene, and poly-silicone compounds. Polyethylene and polypropylene were also found in seawater, suggesting local production of airborne microplastic particles. Terminal velocity estimations and back trajectory analysis support this conclusion. For technical reasons, only particles larger than 5 µm, at the upper end of a typical marine atmospheric size distribution, were analyzed, suggesting that our analyses underestimate the presence of airborne microplastic particles in the remote marine atmosphere.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85103118071&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1038/s43247-020-00061-y
DO - 10.1038/s43247-020-00061-y
M3 - مقالة
SN - 2662-4435
VL - 1
JO - Communications Earth & Environment
JF - Communications Earth & Environment
IS - 1
M1 - 64
ER -