Threats
Sea turtles often mistake plastic bags for this favourite food source.
What are jellyfish?
This kind of source is where the vast majority of microplastics in the ocean originate from.
What are land-based sources?
About ~85% of marine debris consists of this material.
What is plastic?
This term refers to the accidental capture of marine organisms during ocean clean-up processes.
What is bycatch?
Areas of the ocean where this kind of resource-gathering activity occurs are particularly vulnerable to marine debris accumulation.
What is fishing?
Marine organisms that employ this feeding strategy are particularly vulnerable to microplastic ingestion.
What is filter-feeding?
These are the most common single-use plastic products found on beaches, according to the Ocean Conservancy.
What are food wrappers, beverage bottles, grocery bags, straws, and takeout containers?
This one of the "3 R's" is the most effective way to stop microplastics and other debris from reaching the marine environment.
What is "reduce"?
These organisms have been proposed to contribute to microplastic clean-up through ingestion and/or adsorption.
What are corals, clams, barnacles, and algae?
This famous, massive collection of marine debris is larger than Texas and located between California and Hawaii.
What is the Great Pacific Garbage Patch?
Marine debris can travel long distances, allowing this kind of species to reach new habitats and sometimes outcompete the native biota.
What are invasive species?
Nearly a third of microplastics found in the ocean come from these, breaking off of them due to road friction.
What are car tires?
These particles are the result of microplastics breaking down even further.
What are nanoplastics?
To the nearest 10 million, this weight of trash (pounds) was removed from oceans and rivers in 2025.
What is 55 million pounds?
Out of the high Arctic and Antarctic waters, the bottom of the Mariana Trench, and the mid-Atlantic ridge, which of these locations is largely free of microplastics?
What is none of them? Trick question! Microplastics have been found pretty much everywhere in the ocean.
The rough percentage of global greenhouse gas emissions that result from plastic production. (Closest guess wins)
What is ~3 percent?
The global production of plastic in 2025 to the nearest 50 million tonnes.
What is 445 million tonnes?
Microplastics largely break down over time due to this process as opposed to biodegradation, mostly as the result of UV light.
What is photodegradation?
Some argue that plastic alternatives are more harmful to the environment than plastic due to increased amounts of this byproduct.
What are greenhouse gas emissions?
This kind of large circular current in the ocean is often a place where microplastics and marine debris in general accumulates.
What is a gyre?
This somewhat spooky-sounding name is given to fishing gear that is either intentionally or unintentionally abandoned and can go on to entrap marine life.
What is "ghost gear" or "ghost nets"?
Because of the way trash travels, this geographic area of land that separates waters flowing to different rivers can be a source of marine debris, even if it's miles inland.
What is "watershed"?
This is how long it takes plastics to decompose in the ocean to the nearest 50 years.
What is 450 years?
This is the most effective technique for large scale open-ocean microplastic clean up.
What is nothing!?
This is the process where colonies of microorganisms, algae or other small animals accumulate on the surface of plastic, causing buoyant plastics to sink.
What is biofouling?