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VERSION:2.0
PRODID:icalendar-ruby
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
X-WR-CALNAME:Constraining atmospheric micro plastics
X-WR-TIMEZONE:Eastern Time (US & Canada)
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTAMP:20260517T220736Z
UID:tag:localist.com\,2008:EventInstance_38936735806754
DTSTART:20220311T170000Z
DTEND:20220311T180000Z
DESCRIPTION:Register here: https://harvard.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJcucO6
 srDgoGN1GFfS3HDyt57ah23r003CJ\n\nAbstract\n\nPlastic pollution is one of t
 he most pressing environmental and social issues of the 21 st century. Rec
 ent work has highlighted the atmospheric role in transporting human-derive
 d microplastics to remote location. Here we use in situ observations of mi
 croplastic deposition combined with an atmospheric\ntransport model and op
 timal estimation techniques to test hypotheses of the most likely sources 
 of atmospheric plastic. Results suggest that atmospheric microplastics are
  primarily derived from secondary re-emission sources including road\, oce
 an\, and soil sources. However\, due to limited observations and understan
 ding of the source processes\, there are still large uncertainties in sour
 ce attribution. In the western USA\, the dominant sources of microplastic 
 were from roads (84%)\, the ocean (11%) and agricultural dust (5%). Using 
 our best estimate of plastic sources and modeled transport pathways\, most
  continents were net importers of plastics from the marine environment\, u
 nderscoring the cumulative role of legacy pollution in contributing to the
  atmospheric burden of plastic. This effort is the first to use high resol
 ution spatial and temporal deposition data along with different hypothesiz
 ed emission sources to constrain atmospheric plastic. Parallel to global b
 iogeochemical cycles\, plastics now spiral around the globe with distinct 
 atmospheric\, oceanic\, cryospheric\, and terrestrial lifetimes. Though ad
 vancements have been made on the manufacture of biodegradable polymers\, o
 ur data suggest that the non-biodegradable polymers will continue to cycle
  through the surface Earth. Because of the limited\nobservations and knowl
 edge\, there remain large uncertainties in the sources\, transport and dep
 osition of microplastics. Thus\, we prioritize future research directions 
 for understanding the plastic cycle.
LOCATION:
SUMMARY:Constraining atmospheric micro plastics
URL;VALUE=URI:https://events.seas.harvard.edu/event/guest_speaker_natalie_m
 ahowald_professor_cornell_university
CATEGORIES:Colloquia / Seminar / Lecture
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