Microplastics may be changing the colour of the Pacific Ocean

Far out in the North Pacific Ocean, a floating mass of rubbish may be doing more than polluting the water. New research suggests that these tiny plastic particles could be altering how sunlight scatters across the ocean, creating a subtle blue-green tint that satellites have detected over two decades. The particles responsible are too small to see from orbit.

"We were shocked, excited, and a little alarmed to see the same shift in ocean colour on the map after we analysed the first satellite dataset of the garbage patch," ocean optics specialist Shea Cheatham of the University of Bergen in Norway told ScienceAlert. The findings of the study are published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment.A garbage patch that's turning the ocean bluerThe Great Pacific Garbage Patch sits inside a slow, circular system of currents called a gyre, which gathers plastic from a huge area. Its size is roughly twice that of Texas.

Despite the name, it isn't one island of junk. The debris is so thinly spread that satellites had never picked it up.Counting pieces gives a clearer picture.