I don’t usually venture into marine ecology or geochemistry—these worlds seem to be disparately separated from the terrestrial ecosystems I’m used to—so I won’t attempt to analyze the science that’s going on. But I read a recent article in Discover about the great pacific trash mass. It’s amazing how as we continue to generate (and throw away) all this plastic, it accumulates in every conceivable place on the planet and takes forever to break down.
But it got me thinking. When I was reading The World Without Us a while back, I remember the author mentioning how bacteria will likely evolve in landfills to thrive on plastics. But what about the ocean? Could this primordial plastic soup be the place where bacteria finally evolve to efficiently eat all those nasty synthetic polymers? Maybe someone should be out there should be testing that stuff to see if such species are already out there (maybe this kid)?
image credit: flickr
Umph, that kid is making me feel bad about myself. At that age, I only cared about… well, not digesting plastic bags. I’ll leave it at that.
Doesn’t seem unreasonable that one day synthetic polymers will be bio-digested. Oil slicks are, right? They are organic matter, I realize, but if there are strains of bacteria that can survive in smoldering haystacks, there are bugs that can digest plastic as well. I am almost scared to ask how the plastic is getting into the oceans in the first place. Did the article mention that?