Waste and Marine Litter
Waste and litter are a significant issue, impacting ecosystems, economies and societies.
Microplastic pollution in the surface waters of Vava'u, Tonga
Marine plastic pollution, particularly microplastics, has been recognised as a global issue in the recent years, but research efforts in the Pacific are lagging. We carried out research on microplastics contamination of surface waters of the Vava'u archipelago, Tonga. Since microplastics smaller than the standard mesh size (333–335 μm) are readily reported in the literature on microplastics, we used a finer plankton net (100 μm) to determine the proportion of captured microplastics smaller than 300 μm. Isolated microplastics were counted and measured using stereomicroscope with polymer identification performed by FTIR spectroscopy. The analysis revealed high microplastics concentrations (329,299.7 ± 40,994.2 pcs km
Status: Completed
Type: Staff Publications
Author: Ana Markic, James H. Bridson, Peta Morton, Lucy Hersey, Thomas Maes, Melissa Bowen
Year of publication: 2022
Publisher: Science Direct
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