NEW FACES
NEW FACES
NEWS BRIEF
Microplastics Pollution Continous 'Oil Spill' By John H. Tibbetts
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ore than 10 million tons of plastic debris escape the waste stream and enter the sea every year, degrading into tiny shards called microplastics, according to Tracy Mincer, Ph.D., who is investigating how plastics disrupt ocean health and sea life. “In terms of fossil hydrocarbon tonnage, plastic pollution can be viewed as one of the biggest oil spills in history, reoccurring each year, but no one is looking at it that way,” says Mincer, research professor at FAU Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute and Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College. Mincer is part of a growing effort to learn how to measure and understand marine microplastics. Plastic debris inadvertently discharged into the ocean is on par with the nine largest marine oil spills in history combined, in terms of fossil hydrocarbon amount, Mincer said. As marine
Tracy Mincer, FAU Harbor Branch and Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College, is part of a growing global effort to learn how to measure and understand marine microplastics.
the same size as the prey of many marine animals. These particles have been found in the digestive tracts of more than 100 different species, causing a range of physical, chemical and potential biological harm. Mincer received his Ph.D. in marine chemistry in 2004 Mincer, Ph.D. from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. He served as a postdoctoral researcher and lecturer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and as a faculty member at the Woods Hole
"Microplastics have no boundaries in the ocean." – Tracy microplastics break up, they leach smaller hydrocarbons that might attract colonizing microbes similar to those that respond to oil spills. Additionally, microplastics can be 88
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Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts. Plastic garbage patches across miles of surface ocean receive widespread media attention, he said. But microplastics in the water column are largely unexplored. Mincer collaborates with FAU engineers to use spectroscopic tools, sensors and eventually robots that could identify marine microplastics in real time, guiding policymakers and informing the public. Some nations have been better than others at managing plastic waste, so global initiatives are needed. “Microplastics,” he said, “have no boundaries in the ocean.” t