A comparison of plastic and plankton in the north Pacific central gyre.

Gooseneck barnacles (Lepas spp.) ingest microplastic debris in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre

Substantial quantities of small plastic particles, termed "microplastic," have been found in many areas of the world ocean, and have accumulated in particularly high densities on the surface of the subtropical gyres. While plastic debris has been documented on the surface of the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre (NPSG) since the early 1970s, the ecological implications remain poorly understood. Or...

ankton Size Spectra in Relation to Ecosystem Productivity, Size, and Perturbation

Quantification and comparisons of the structure of open-water plankton communities from 25 inland lakes of Ontario, from the Laurentian Great Lakes Superior, Huron, St. Clair, Ontario, and Erie, and from the Central Gyre in the North Pacific Ocean were made on the basis of the normalized biomass size spectrum. Residual variation around the fitted straight lines (corresponding to a theoretical s...

Plastic ingestion by planktivorous fishes in the North Pacific Central Gyre.

A significant amount of marine debris has accumulated in the North Pacific Central Gyre (NPCG). The effects on larger marine organisms have been documented through cases of entanglement and ingestion; however, little is known about the effects on lower trophic level marine organisms. This study is the first to document ingestion and quantify the amount of plastic found in the gut of common plan...

Distribution and Ecological Consequences of Plastic Debris in the North Pacific Gyre

A Westward-Intensified Decadal Change in the North Pacific Thermocline and Gyre-Scale Circulation

From the early 1970s to the mid-1980s, the main thermocline of the subarctic gyre of the North Pacific Ocean shoaled with temperatures at 200–400-m depth cooling by 18–48C over the region. The gyre-scale structure of the shoaling is quasi-stationary and intensified in the western part of the basin north of 308N, suggesting concurrent changes in gyre-scale transport. A similar quasi-stationary c...