World's oceans filled with over 5 trillion pieces of plastic

Scientists estimate that there are 5.25 trillion pieces of plastic floating in the world's oceans right now, an amount that totals up to almost 270,000 tons!To make things worse, those numbers are an underestimation.An article recently published in the science journal Plos One describes how plastic has spread to all corners of the Earth. There is as much plastic in the northern hemisphere as the southern, which surprised researchers because most of it originates in the north.The article cites Plastics Europe estimated that 288 million tons of plastic were produced around the world in 2012. Researchers' estimate of the amount of plastic in the ocean around the world is only 0.1 per cent of that number.We may not be eating this plastic, but animals that are often on our dinner plates do."We saw ... fish that ingested fishing lines," said Julia Reisser, a researcher with the University of Western Australia."But there are also chemical impacts. When plastic gets into the water it acts like a magnet for oily pollutants. Bigger fish eat the little fish and then they end up on our plates.

It's hard to tell how much pollution is being ingested but certainly plastics are providing some of it."

Not included in the estimated 5.25 trillion pieces of plastics at sea are pieces that have long since sunk to the bottom of the ocean, are scattered on shorelines, and have been eaten by fish and animals already. Do you make any effort to reduce your waste?

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Half-blind rockfish gets prosthetic eye

Humans aren't the only species that can get bullied - animals also pick on their peers who are different. In light of that, a veterinarian recently gave a rockfish at the Vancouver Aquarium a prosthetic eye to keep it from being picked on by other fish in the tank!The older rockfish developed cataracts and had to have its left eye removed. Head veterinarian Dr. Martin Haulena knew that the other fish in its tank would pick on it for looking sick and weak, so he gave the fish a new eye. Dr. Haluena fixed the prosthetic eye to a bone above its eye socket with nylon stitches and attached it with titanium clips- all while the fish was under anaesthetic."Some people don't realise how much effort we give fish," he said.The rockfish can't see out of the eye, but it's almost impossible to tell that it isn't real!

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The Taj Mahal is turning brown from pollution

The Taj Mahal is an iconic, beautiful structure in India that draws millions of tourists and Muslim pilgrims every year. It is well known for its pristine white marble, but lately that marble hasn't been quite white.The mausoleum is slowly turning a gloomy shade of brown. Some guessed that this was because sulphurous gas or water droplets from fog, but Georgia Institute of Technology researcher Mike Bergin figured out what the real cause of pollutants from cars, cooking smoke, dust, and garbage fires. For a year, Bergin and other researchers from Georgia Tech and India measured particle concentrations in the air around the palace and its walls to figure out what was causing the discolouration and why it couldn't be washed off by rainwater. They found that the pollutant particles stick to the marble, and ultraviolet light from the sun colours them a dirty brown shade. They also found that these particles are not water-soluble, which means they can't be washed off with water."There is some concern regarding the long-term impact of the cleanings on the Taj domes.

The only real way to stop the Taj from discolouration is to find the sources of the particles and figure out a way to substantially decrease emissions," said Bergin. To clean the building, workers cover its outside walls with a layer of clay every few years. They leave it on for a while and then peel it off, which peels off the brown particles and restores the Taj Mahal to its glorious white."The Taj Mahal can be thought of as the lungs of India, since the same particles that deposit on the Taj are being breathed in by people living in the region. The particles are bad for human health. Cleaning up the Taj will certainly make people more healthy in the region,"

Bergin said.Bergin and other researchers have set up air sampling machines around the Taj to monitor air pollution levels, but it is up to the people of India, a country with one of the highest levels of air pollution, to do their part to make the air cleaner.

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