Clare Ostle
Dr Clare Ostle is the co-ordinator of the Pacific Continuous Plankton Recorder (CPR) Survey, at the Marine Biological Association in Plymouth, UK. Her research focuses on the use of CPR data for investigating plankton as indicators of the marine environment, linkages with ocean acidification and the marine carbon cycle, and oceanic plastics.
Visit Dr Clare OstleDeepest plastic debris found in the ocean
The deepest plastic debris found in the sea was a plastic bag found at a depth of 10,898 metres (35,755 ft) in the Pacific Ocean's Mariana Trench by the Global Oceanographic Data Center (GODAC) of the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC), as published in the journal Marine Policy, Volume 96, in Oct 2018. The Global Oceanographic Data Center of JAMSTEC launched the Deep-sea Debris Database for public use in March 2017. From the 5,010 dives in the database, 3,425 man-made debris items were counted. More than 33% of the debris was macro-plastic, of which 89% was single-use products, and these ratios increased to 52% and 92%, respectively, in areas deeper than 6,000 m (19,685 ft).