Plastic debris pervades in our oceans and freshwater systems and the potential ecosystem-level impacts of this anthropogenic litter require urgent evaluation. Microbes readily colonize aquatic plastic debris and members of these biofilm communities are speculated to include pathogenic, toxic, invasive or plastic degrading-species. The influence of plastic-colonizing microorganisms on the fate o...

Accelerated contamination of habitats with debris has caused increased effort to determine ecological impacts. Strikingly, most work on organisms focuses on sublethal responses to plastic debris. This is controversial because (i) researchers have ignored medical insights about the mechanisms that link effects of debris across lower levels of biological organization to disease and mortality, and...

Solid materials, typically waste, that has found its way to the marine environment is called marine debris. It is known to be the cause of injuries and deaths of numerous marine animals and birds, either because they become entangled in it or they mistake it for prey and eat it. At least 267 different species are known to have suffered from entanglement or ingestion of marine debris including s...

Investigators are researching whether consumption of plastic debris by marine organisms translates into toxic exposures for people who eat seafood.

Floating persistent debris, primarilymade fromplastic, disperses long distances from source areas and accumulates in oceanic gyres. However, biofouling can increase the density of debris items to the point where they sink. Buoyancy is related to item volume, whereas fouling is related to surface area, so small items (which have high surface area to volume ratios) should start to sink sooner tha...

Marine debris has been found in marine animals since the early 20th century, but little is known about the impacts of the ingestion of debris in large marine mammals. In this study we describe a case of mortality of a sperm whale related to the ingestion of large amounts of marine debris in the Mediterranean Sea (4th published case worldwide to our knowledge), and discuss it within the context ...

apical extrusion of debris and irrigants during cleaning and shaping of the root canal is one of the main causes of periapical inflammation and postoperative flare-ups. the purpose of this study was to quantitatively measure the amount of debris and irrigants extruded apically in single rooted canals using two reciprocating and one rotary single file nickel-titanium instrumentation systems.sixt...