Incorporating citizen science to study plastics in the environment
Plastic marine debris is a global problem, but due to its widespread and patchy distribution, gathering sufficient samples for scientific research is challenging with limited ship time and human resources. Taking advantage of public interest in the impact of plastic on the marine environment, succes...
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| Published in | Analytical methods Vol. 9; no. 9; pp. 1392 - 143 |
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| Main Authors | , , , , , |
| Format | Journal Article |
| Language | English |
| Published |
2017
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| Subjects | |
| Online Access | Get full text |
| ISSN | 1759-9660 1759-9679 1759-9679 |
| DOI | 10.1039/c6ay02716d |
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| Summary: | Plastic marine debris is a global problem, but due to its widespread and patchy distribution, gathering sufficient samples for scientific research is challenging with limited ship time and human resources. Taking advantage of public interest in the impact of plastic on the marine environment, successful Citizen Science (CS) programs incorporate members of the public to provide repeated sampling for time series as well as synoptic collections over wide geographic regions. A key challenge with any CS program is to ensure standardized methods and quality control so that the samples and data can legitimately be compared and used in peer-reviewed research. This article describes several successful examples and outlines suggestions for projects cooperating with citizen scientists to provide reliable samples and accurate data, with benefits to science, citizen scientists, and society in general.
Plastic marine debris is a global problem, but due to its widespread and patchy distribution, gathering sufficient samples for scientific research is challenging with limited ship time and human resources. |
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| Bibliography: | Linda Amaral-Zettler is an Associate Scientist at the Josephine Bay Paul Center for Comparative Molecular Biology and Evolution at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, MA. She is also an Associate Professor in the Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. She obtained her Ph.D. in Biological Oceanography at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology/Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Joint Program after receiving a Bachelor of Science in Aquatic Biology at Brown University. Amaral-Zettler's research investigates the relationships between microbes and the mechanisms that determine their diversity, distribution, survival and impact on local and global processes. From 2004-2010 she was the Program Manager and Education and Outreach Lead for the International Census of Marine Microbes Shige Takada received a PhD from Tokyo Metropolitan University in 1989. He has worked at Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology for 29 years. His speciality is trace analysis of organic contaminants including persistent organic pollutants, endocrine disrupting chemicals, pharmaceuticals and antibiotics as well as anthropogenic molecular markers. His research field encompasses from Tokyo Bay to Southeast Asia to Africa. In 2005, Shige Takada initiated International Pellet Watch, global monitoring of POPs by using beached plastic resin pellets http://www.pelletwatch.org Erik Zettler is a microbial ecologist who received his PhD from the Autonomous University of Madrid, Spain. In 1985 he joined the Biology Department at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution where he worked primarily on open ocean picoplankton. In 1994 he started working at the SEA Education Association, as Science Coordinator, then Professor and Associate Dean. It was during research cruises with undergraduate students on the SEA sailing research vessels that he first became interested in plastic marine debris, and particularly the role of microbial biofilms on the fate of plastic in aquatic systems. After retiring from SEA in 2016, he co-founded Oekologia Environmental Research and Education. Erik has worked at field sites in Antarctica, Bermuda, Canada, Costa Rica, Portugal, Spain, and the USA, and participated in over 50 research cruises collecting oceanographic data including plastic marine debris in the Pacific, Atlantic, Caribbean, and Mediterranean. His research for the last 20 years has been facilitated by student citizen scientists, and whenever possible, he escapes from his computer to work and teach in the field. He works with ~100 NGOs and individuals concerned with marine plastic pollution. International Pellet Watch tells us the hazard associated with chemicals accumulated in microplastics in marine environments and their potential adverse effects on marine ecosystems. Shige Takada is the author of more than 150 peer-reviewed papers in international journals with H-index of 41 and more than 30 invited speeches at international conferences. Nicholas Mallos is Director of the Trash Free Seas Program at Ocean Conservancy. Nick oversees Ocean Conservancy's work on marine debris, including its global initiative on ocean plastics, annual International Coastal Cleanup, and the Trash Free Seas Alliance®, a co-operative group of businesses, leading environmental organizations and scientists focused on reducing plastic inputs into the ocean by 50% by 2025. Nick has extensive field experience researching ocean plastics - his debris-related assignments have taken him from the North Pacific Gyre to the remote coastlines of Alaska and the tsunami-stricken shores of Japan. He has testified before the U.S. Senate on the sources and impacts of plastic debris in the ocean, and routinely participates in international policy discussions at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, United Nations Environment Programme, and other global fora. Nick received his master's degree from the Nicholas School of the Environment at Duke University, and a B.S. in biology and marine science from Dickinson College. Nick serves as a subject matter expert for CNN, and is based at Ocean Conservancy's office in Portland, OR. Marcus Eriksen is the Director of Research and co-founder of the 5 Gyres Institute. His work has focused primarily on the abundance and distribution of plastic in the marine environment. Recently he has been researching upstream sources of microplastics, which have led to the intersection of science and public engagement, with the hope of creating citizen science protocols for long-term monitoring programs. In 2013, the 5 Gyres Institute, in collaboration with SUNY Fredonia, discovered microbeads in the Great Lakes, supporting public-facing campaigns that led to federal policy to mitigate product design, proving the value of science and citizen's groups working together. Bonnie Monteleone is the Director of Science, Research and Academic Partnerships as well as the Executive Director for Plastic Ocean Project, Inc (501c3) organizing outreach and citizen science projects involving plastic marine debris. Monteleone also works in the Chemistry Department at UNC Wilmington as an Administrative Assistant and plastic marine debris research assistant working with undergraduate and graduate Directed Independent Studies research projects. Research projects vary from fieldwork collecting open-ocean and beach samples to lab analysis looking at plastic leachates, persistent organic pollutants sorption, and plastic ingestion by marine organisms. http://icomm.mbl.edu a global effort to census the microbial ocean as part of the Census of Marine Life Program. She led the NSF-funded MIRADA-LTERS project that carried out microbial biodiversity inventories and is exploring large-scale patterns in microbial biogeography across the 13 aquatic US Long Term Ecological Research Sites. She employs next generation DNA sequencing to understand the presence and persistence of pathogens and harmful algal blooming species. Her current research investigates microbes on Plastic Marine Debris and the "Plastisphere". ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 |
| ISSN: | 1759-9660 1759-9679 1759-9679 |
| DOI: | 10.1039/c6ay02716d |