百科知識視頻之煎蛋小學堂27 大海里的塑料微粒

In many ways,plastic is the perfect material:we can make it strong and rigid enough to build spaceships and replace bones,or thin and flexible enough to makes shopping bags,that weigh as much as a nickel but carry up to 8 kilograms.

在很多方面，塑料都是完美材料，塑料可以非常牢固堅硬，以制造航天飛船，替代骨骼，也可以很薄很堅韌，以制造購物袋，一塊薄鎳幣厚度的塑料袋就能支撐8公斤重量。

And unlike other materials,plastic doesn't rust or rot,it can last for centuries,even when we only need it to last a few seconds.We make tons of plastic precisely because it's cheap,durable and yet expendable.But the features of plastic that make it so useful to us have also transformed life in the oceans,where as much as 10% of our discarded plastic-millions of tons per year-ends up.

但是和其他材料不同的是，塑料保和省銹蝕也不會腐爛，即便我們有時只需要幾秒鐘，塑料卻能挺過好幾個世紀。人們大量生產(chǎn)塑料因為它便宜又耐用，但是塑料依然屬于消耗品。人們懂得利用塑料的特性，但也因為如此，塑料改變了海洋生物，每年全球10%的廢棄塑料進入海洋。

Big pieces of plastic are definitely bad news for marine animals like whales,albatross,and sea turtles which risk getting tangled in the debris or ingesting large pieces of it.Yet despite the publicity about huge garbage patches in the sea.most of the ocean's plastic isn't big,our castaway shopping bags and soda bottles get weakened by sunlight.and torn apart in the wind and the waves into little bits of plastic confetti.

對于鯨，信天翁和海龜?shù)群Ｑ笊飦碚f，大塊塑料當然不好，海洋生物可能被塑料纏住，或吞下大塊塑料。雖然媒體中出現(xiàn)在海中的都是大塊塑料，但是大多數(shù)海洋中的塑料并不大，購物袋和汽水瓶會在陽光下變薄 被海風和海浪撕扯成為小塊碎渣。

On the micro-scale,though,it's still super durable the microorganisms that decompose ripped-up bits of wood and seaweed down into simpler organic compounds can't easily digest plastic.So while the plastic confetti gets broken into smaller pieces,it doesn't go away it just spreads out over time.

從微觀角度看，塑料依然無法被微生物分解 分解木頭和海藻的微生物無法輕易消化塑料。所以雖然塑料碎渣碎成更小顆粒，但并未消失 時間過去，塑料只是擴散開來。

Which is why we've found"microplastics"pretty much everywhere in the oceans,from the Arctic to the Antarctic,and from the seafloor to the surface.Unlike the easy-to-observe impacts of large plastic trash.the effects of microplastics are as subtle and difficult to trace as the fragments themselves:the durable fragments can serve as new real estate,on which small ocean creatures can grow and multiply;or choke slightly larger ocean creatures that think the plastics are food;or attract and collect toxic chemicals,which become introduced into the food chain if the particles are eaten;and probably a million other problems we haven't noticed yet.

這就是為什么幾乎全世界任何海洋中都發(fā)現(xiàn)了塑料微粒，從北極洲到南極洲 從海底到海面 和大塊塑料垃圾不同，塑料微粒的影響不易觀察，和微粒本身一樣，其造成的影響微妙且很難追蹤：耐性良好的碎片會成為生物新的棲息地 小型海洋生物在其上生長繁殖。稍稍大些的海洋生物會認為塑料是食物，如果吞下就造成阻塞。塑料也會吸附并積累有毒化學物質(zhì) 如果微粒被動物吃下會進入食物鏈。也許還有更多問題，只是我們還未察覺到。

Because we've only recently started paying attention to all these microplastics in the oceans.But it's undeniable how much plastic trash we've introduced into marine ecosystems,and the wonderful durability of plastic guarantees it'll be an issue for years to come.it's possible we can decrease further impact by Switching to biodegradable plastics,dumping less plastic in the oceans,or cleaning up the patches of sea most strewn with plastic.

因為我們也只是剛剛開始關注海洋中的塑料微粒問題。人類向海洋生態(tài)系統(tǒng)傾倒塑料垃圾數(shù)量之巨不容置疑，塑料驚人的耐性肯定會在未來的日子里成為一項難題 但是我們可以改用生物降解塑料減少以后塑料造成的影響，減少向海洋傾倒的塑料量，或是清理堆滿塑料的海岸。

But until we do,the question is,will the oceans be plastic enough to deal with our favorite material?

不過在此之前，我們要問海洋是否能夠適應我們最喜歡的塑料?