ABOVE: Researchers can easily get through hundreds of disposable pipette tips and microcentrifuge tubes a day.
ISTOCK, JVISENTIN
Worldwide, at least 300 million metric tons of plastic are produced each year, and researchers in California recently estimated that more than 90 percent of it is never recycled. Although plastic products are inherently designed to be long-lasting and stable, around half of the world’s annually produced plastics are intended to be used only once, leading to huge amounts of unwanted, slow-degrading material.
As evidenced by the notorious larger-than-Texas raft of garbage floating in the Pacific Ocean, and reports of seabirds and whales dying after ingesting copious amounts of plastic in their habitats, the pollution caused by humans mindlessly discarding these materials has already taken a serious toll on the environment. And scientists have yet to map out the longer-term effects of tiny particles of plastic waste, or microplastics, that pollute terrestrial and ...
