Ocean swimming... in plastic pollution

It is estimated that ocean plastics will outweigh ocean fish by 2050, according to a study by the World Economic Forum (www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_The_New_Plastics_Economy.pdf) . There are at least 5.25 trillion plastic (theguardian.com/environment/2014/dec/10/full-scale-plastic-worlds-oceans-revealed-first-time-pollution) pieces floating in the oceans right now (washingtonpost.com/graphics/2017/world/global-waste) .

Dr. Jennifer Lavers (jenniferlavers.org) is a Research Scientist (utas.edu.au/profiles/staff/imas/Jennifer-Lavers) at the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies (imas.utas.edu.au) at the University of Tasmania (utas.edu.au) . She is a marine eco-toxicologist with expertise in tropical and temperate seabird ecology, plastic pollution (marine debris), invasive species management, and fisheries by-catch. Her research examines how marine apex predators, such as seabirds, act as sentinels of ocean health, and focuses on pollutants of aquatic ecosystems such as plastic, heavy metals, Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) and radionuclides. She is also very interested in science and conservation outreach.

Jennifer also has an Erdos-Bacon number (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erd%C5%91s%E2%80%93Bacon_number) , as a star of the stage and screen, as well as of academia!

I chatted to Jennifer about her work, starting with her article This South Pacific island of rubbish shows why we need to quit our plastic habit (theconversation.com/this-south-pacific-island-of-rubbish-shows-why-we-need-to-quit-our-plastic-habit-77860) .

Songs in this episode - all licensed under a Creative Commons License (creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)

• Happy Life - Fredji (soundcloud.com/fredjimusic/fredji-happy-life-original-mix)

• Acoustic guitar arrangement for song - TRow (soundcloud.com/megatrev/acoustic-guitar-arrangement)

• A new beginning - Bensound (bensound.com/royalty-free-music/track/a-new-beginning)

• Buddha - Kontekst (soundcloud.com/kontekstmusic/buddha)

• Sapphire - Tobu (soundcloud.com/7obu)