In the Tyrrhenian it is a record of microplastics on the seabed

2020-04-30T18:22:41.569Z

In the Tyrrhenian Sea there is the highest concentration of microplastics ever measured in the world's seabed: up to 1.9 million fragments per square meter can be counted in the stretch of sea between Tuscany, Lazio, Sardinia and Corsica. This is indicated by the study published in Science by the universities of Manchester, Durham and Bremen, together with the British Oceanographic Center (Noc) and the French Research Institute for the Exploitation of the Sea (Ifremer). The microplastics found in the Tyrrhenian seabed are mostly made up of textile fibers that are not effectively retained by the waste water treatment plants. The analysis of the samples, crossed with the maps of the seabed and the models of the deep sea currents, have made it possible to understand that the microplastics are not distributed evenly: in reality they concentrate and deposit in specific areas, hotspots that represent for the seabed that which are the 'garbage islands' for the most superficial waters. The 'engine' of these displacements are the same deep marine currents that carry oxygen and nutrients: this means that microplastics end up accumulating in the points where they are concentrated the greatest marine biodiversity, risking to be more easily absorbed or ingested by living beings that they inhabit the abysses. The study is the first to highlight the direct link between the currents and the concentration of microplastics: for this reason, researchers hope that it will be useful to predict the areas of the seabed that are most affected by this phenomenon in the world, thus being able to directly examine the impact that microplastics have on the marine ecosystem.