There’s so much Plastic in the Oceans Scientists Want to Study it from Space

Meghan Bartels from Newsweek recently interviewed University of Connecticut professor Heidi Dierssen for an article detailing the potential to use satellite imagery to estimate floating marine plastics. Dr. Dierssen recently published a paper with her postdoctoral student Dr. Shungu Garaba in Remote Sensing of the Environment analyzing the spectral properties and potential for remote sensing of marine macro- and microplastics as part of a NASA-funded project for the proposed hyperspectral satellite mission PACE.   Bartels writes:  “To know that it’s actually plastic and not something else floating or even a bubble or a whitecap, we have to have more of a sense of the spectral fingerprint and what’s unique to plastics,” Dierssen said. “It’s going to be very challenging.”

 

Read the complete article here: http://www.newsweek.com/theres-so-much-plastic-oceans-scientists-want-study-it-space-853787