Plastic pollution on the world’s coral reefs (original) (raw)

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Data are available at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7679509. Source data are provided with this paper.

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A Correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-023-06796-w

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Acknowledgements

We are grateful to many colleagues who helped in the field and with discussions: W. D. Anderson, C. Baldwin, M. Bell, T. Bowling, M. Bozinovic, C. Castillo, D. Catania, A. Chequer, L. Colin, P. Colin, J. M. Copus (in memoriam), S. D. T. Delfino, T. Donaldson, I. Escote, C. E. L. Ferreira, A. A. V. Flores, C. Flook, J. Fong, R. C. Garla, J. L. Gasparini, B. Greene, G. Goodbody-Gringley, J. Harris, E. Jessup, J. C. Joyeux, L. Labe, M. Lane, S. Lindfield, R. M. Macieira, J. E. McCosker, P. Muller, N. Nazarian, R. Palmer, C. R. Pimentel, J. Pitt, R. Pyle, J. A. Reis-Filho, C. R. Rocha, A. D. Rogers, M. Samoilys, T. Sinclair-Taylor, G. Siu, A. Shafer, C. E. Stein, M. Vermeij, M. Vilela, T. Warren and L. Webber. Hollis Rebreathers LLC, the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences, Anilao Beach Club, Pohnpei Surf Club, MDA Guam, Triangle Diving, Substation Curaçao, RV Angra Pequena M/V Alucia, M/V Ocean Zephyr, M/V Iron Joy, R/V Baseline Explorer, Pizzaria Namoita, Atlantis Divers, C. Cicculo, Global Subdive, ROV Support A/S, Brownies Global Logistics, the technical divers of Global Underwater Explorers (M. McClellan, M. Tanguay, S. Bird, K. Dow, G. Blackmore, J. P. Bressor, S. E. Kim, and K. Kim). A special thanks also goes out to the various departments of the Seychelles Government, especially the Ministry of Agriculture, Climate Change and Environment, the Islands Development Company, the Island Conservation Society and the Seychelles Islands Foundation for their continuous support and access and facilitation to the Seychelles outer islands. We also thank the Seychelles Fishing Authority, The Nature Conservancy, University of Seychelles, The Seychelles Conservation and Climate Adaptation Trust, Alphonse Foundation, Blue Safaris Seychelles, Desroches Foundation, Marine Conservation Society Seychelles, Nature Seychelles, Poivre Foundation, Save our Seas Foundation, and Indies Trader provided gear and logistical support. We are grateful for the support of donors who endorsed the California Academy of Sciences’ Hope for Reefs initiative and funding expeditions throughout the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. We also thank National Science Foundation (grant DEB 12576304 to L.A.R.), Fundação Grupo O Boticário de Proteção à Natureza (grant 1141_20182 to H.T.P. and L.A.R.), Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (grant 2019/24215-2 to H.T.P., J.P.Q., R.F.F. and L.A.R., and grant 2021/07039-6 to H.T.P.) for essential funding. L.A.R. was supported through a Rolex Award for Enterprise, and R.F.F. through a CNPq fellowship (#309651/2021-2). ROV surveys in the Coral Sea conducted by B.J.C. and G.F.G. were funded by an Our Marine Parks Round 2 Grant (4-FISKTNX) to A. S. Hoey, M. S. Pratchett and A. Barnett (James Cook University) by Australian Marine Parks (Australian Federal Government). Research permits were secured through partnership with the Philippine Department of Agriculture - Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources, the Bahamas Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Department of Fisheries of Pohnpei (Federated States of Micronesia), the Department of Environment and Natural Resources of Curaçao, the Ministry of Fisheries of French Polynesia, the Marshall Islands Marine Resources Authority, Brazilian Environmental Agency (ICMBio), US Fish and Wildlife Service, Ministry of Resources and Development of Palau, Department of Environment and Natural Resources (Bermuda), Ministry of Agriculture, Climate Change and Environment (Seychelles), Ministry of Agriculture, Fishing, Environment, Spatial Planning and Urban Development (Comoros) and Australian Marine Parks (Australia, permit number PA2020-00092; Part8A: AU-COM2021-504. Expeditions to Bermuda and Seychelles were facilitated by the Nekton Foundation (grant to L.C.W. and P.V.S.). Bermuda surveys were conducted as part of XL Catlin Deep Ocean Survey with license 2016070751, permission 87/2016 and special permit 160702; Seychelles research was conducted during the Seychelles: First Descent Expedition, under permit 524, with funding from Omega and Kensington Tours; Comoros data were collected with funding from Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund by partners University of Comoros, Comoros Directorate of Fisheries, Wildlands Conservation Trust, SAIAB, Nekton and CORDIO. This is Nekton contribution 35.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Ichthyology, California Academy of Sciences, San Francisco, CA, USA
    Hudson T. Pinheiro, Chancey MacDonald, Tyler A. Phelps & Luiz A. Rocha
  2. Center for Marine Biology, University of São Paulo, São Sebastião, Brazil
    Hudson T. Pinheiro, Ronaldo Francini-Filho & Juan P. Quimbayo
  3. Faculty of Biological Sciences, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK
    Chancey MacDonald
  4. Instituto de Ciências Biológicas e da Saúde, Universidade Federal de Alagoas, Cidade Universitária, Maceió, Brazil
    Robson G. Santos
  5. Faculté des Sciences Techniques, Université des Comores, Mvouni, Comoros
    Ramadhoine Ali
  6. Wildlands Conservation Trust, Pietermaritzburg, South Africa
    Ayesha Bobat
  7. Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies and College of Science and Engineering James Cook University, Townsville, Queensland, Australia
    Benjamin J. Cresswell & Gemma F. Galbraith
  8. Instituto de Engenharia e Ciências do Mar, Universidade Técnica do Atlântico, Mindelo, Cabo Verde
    Rui Freitas
  9. CORDIO East Africa, Mombasa, Kenya
    Peter Musembi
  10. Wildlife Conservation Society, Kenya Marine Program, Mombasa, Kenya
    Peter Musembi
  11. Department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA
    Juan P. Quimbayo
  12. Akkeshi Marine Station, Field Science Center for Northern Biosphere, Hokkaido University, Hokkaido, Japan
    T. E. Angela L. Quiros
  13. Steinhart Aquarium, California Academy of Sciences, San Francisco, CA, USA
    Bart Shepherd
  14. Department of Biology, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
    Paris V. Stefanoudis & Lucy C. Woodall
  15. Nekton Foundation, Oxford, UK
    Paris V. Stefanoudis, Sheena Talma & Lucy C. Woodall
  16. Museum of Natural History, Oxford University, Oxford, UK
    Paris V. Stefanoudis
  17. Departamento de Oceanografia, Universidade Federal do Espírito Santo, Vitória, Brazil
    João B. Teixeira
  18. Center of Ecology and Conservation, University of Exeter, Exeter, UK
    Lucy C. Woodall

Authors

  1. Hudson T. Pinheiro
  2. Chancey MacDonald
  3. Robson G. Santos
  4. Ramadhoine Ali
  5. Ayesha Bobat
  6. Benjamin J. Cresswell
  7. Ronaldo Francini-Filho
  8. Rui Freitas
  9. Gemma F. Galbraith
  10. Peter Musembi
  11. Tyler A. Phelps
  12. Juan P. Quimbayo
  13. T. E. Angela L. Quiros
  14. Bart Shepherd
  15. Paris V. Stefanoudis
  16. Sheena Talma
  17. João B. Teixeira
  18. Lucy C. Woodall
  19. Luiz A. Rocha

Contributions

H.T.P., R.G.S., C.M. and L.A.R. designed the study. H.T.P., C.M., R.G.S., A.B., B.J.C., G.F.G., P.M., T.A.P., B.S., P.V.S., J.B.T., L.C.W. and L.A.R. collected the data. C.M., H.T.P. and R.F.F. led the investigation. C.M. and L.A.R. worked on the visualization. H.T.P. and R.G.S. led the original draft. All authors discussed the results, reviewed, edited and commented on the paper.

Corresponding author

Correspondence toHudson T. Pinheiro.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Extended data figures and tables

Extended Data Fig. 2 The influence of environmental and anthropogenic factors on the abundance of anthropogenic debris on coral reefs.

These models differ from those in Fig. 4 in the main text as they consider non-linear depth effects, rather than the effects of depth considered in the three common categorical depth zones. Estimates of predictor effects on anthropogenic debris for: (a) all debris, (b) fishing plastic debris, (c) consumer plastic debris, and (d) non-plastic debris. Lines of each density plot show the 95% credibility intervals and the shaded areas show the 80% intervals. Blue density plots indicate negative relationships between predictor variables and debris density, whereas tan density plots indicate positive relationships. Darker colours indicate relationships supported with > 95% credibility and lighter colours with > 80% credibility (shaded area of each density plot). Grey density plots indicate predictors with relationships that have < 80% credibility. Categorical effects are relative to estimates from samples in the shallow depth zone, and with low complexity.

Source data

Extended Data Fig. 3 NMDS analysis of the abundance of distinct categories and sizes of anthropogenic debris organized in relation to levels of habitat complexity and depth zones of coral reefs.

The composition of plastics here is separated into fifteen classes: five size classes for each of three debris types. ‘plastics’ = all non-fishing-related plastics, ‘fishing’ = all fishing related plastics, ‘other’ = all non-plastic debris. Size 1 = 5 – 10 cm, Size 2 = 10 – 25 cm, Size 3 = 25 – 50 cm, Size 4 = 50 – 100 cm, and Size 5 = >100 cm.

Source data

Extended Data Table 1 Summary information on the methods, effort and results for quantifying anthropogenic debris in each studied coral reef location

Full size table

Extended Data Table 2 Probability of effects (influence unequal to zero) of each analysed variable on the density of anthropogenic debris on coral reefs

Full size table

Extended Data Table 3 Leave-one-out cross validation comparison of model fits for models using depth as a continuous or categorical predictor, calculated as the difference (and standard error) in expected log pointwise predictive density (ELPD)

Full size table

Supplementary information

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Pinheiro, H.T., MacDonald, C., Santos, R.G. et al. Plastic pollution on the world’s coral reefs.Nature 619, 311–316 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-023-06113-5

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