All Eyes on the Antartic

By: Joanna Perez

Graphical depiction of the micro-plastic findings in the water samples from the Antarctic scientific research stations.

The Antarctic ocean is under a numerous amount of threats, but microplastic and macroplastic pollution is the main concern. The plastic that is collecting on the seafloor and the shorelines is directly affecting many different organisms ranging from planktonic organisms to birds and fish by ingestion or by predators eating prey that already have plastic inside them. Microplastics are an emerging pollutant because of the abundance being found in the oceans. Many questions are still not answered such as the fate of the plastic and where all this plastic is finding its way to the oceans. Waller et al. (2017) analyzed and put together past and current studies to raise awareness that we should be doing more to understand the sources and the scale of this pollution. Based on analyzing these studies, there needs to be a tighter regulation on the use and release of plastics in the ocean and sampling and extraction techniques need to be done to map and evaluate plastics distribution. Being proactive is the best bet in order to salvage the marine life we have and to keep our oceans clean.


Waller CL, Griffiths HJ, Waluda CM, Thorpe SE, Loaiza I, Moreno B, et al. (2017). Microplastics in the Antarctic marine system: An emerging area of research. Science of The Total Environment 598:220-227.