Plastic

As part of its mission to tackle plastic pollution in the marine environment, The Ocean Cleanup project plans to sell goods made from the waste it recovers to fund its ongoing operations, and has just unveiled its very first product.

In order to keep water from evaporating from the soil, farmers often cover the ground around their crop plants with sheets of polyethylene plastic. There could soon be a more eco-friendly alternative, though, in the form of soybean oil-coated sand.

Laundry cycles see our clothes shed huge amounts of microplastic fibers into the wastewater and scientists have now made an effort to quantify this, estimating that millions of metric tonnes of synthetic fibers have entered waterbodies since 1950.

What kind of threat can tiny plastic fragments pose to the health of living organisms? Scientists have turned to human tissue for answers, and discovered evidence of plastic fragments in every single sample they studied.

A new study has cast doubt over one method of cleaning up ocean plastics in floating trash-collection barriers, finding that these devices are unlikely to put a dent in the overall problem, even if left to run well into next century.

A new study mapping the movement of plastic waste has projected that 1.3 billion tonnes of it will be dumped on land and in the oceans by 2040, unless some significant steps are taken to address the trend.

Driven by the huge burden they place on the environment, scientists are continually looking for new ways to manufacture plastic materials that make them easier to recycle, and MIT researchers are now claiming a significant breakthrough in this area.

Researchers working to trace the path of plastic waste through the marine environment have discovered the highest concentration of microplastics ever recorded on the seafloor, the result of deep-sea currents that act like conveyor belts for our trash.

Scientists at Cornell University have been working on more environmentally friendly forms of plastic for the fishing industry, and have come up with a new plastic material that can break down much more quickly when exposed to UV light.

Scientists at Cardiff University have come up with a way of estimating the maximum size of plastic pieces different marine creatures can consume, which could help assess the risks different types of waste pose to species around the globe

Biologists working at Canada’s Brandon University have made an exciting discovery, zeroing in on the mechanisms that enable a common species of caterpillar to survive on a diet of plastic alone.

Research from a team of US scientists is again raising doubt over the safety of “BPA-free” plastic products. The animal studies described in a new article suggest bisphenol S (BPS) “causes almost identical changes in gene expression” compared to BPA.