Researchers created a map that could help trace who contributed what to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.
The patch is an environmental concern located between Hawaii and California where the surface is covered in pieces of plastic. The particles outweigh plankton and are a threat to fish, birds and turtles that eat the trash, the American Institute of Physics (AIP) reported. The patch is believed to be one of five, each located in the center of strong currents called "gyres" that trap the debris.
"In some cases, you can have a country far away from a garbage patch that's unexpectedly contributing directly to the patch," said Gary Froyland, a mathematician at UNSW.
The new model could also show how garbage leaks from one patch to another.
"We can use the new model to explore, for example, how quickly trash from Australia ends up in the north Pacific," oceanographer Erik van Sebille said.
The researchers divided the ocean into seven regions in which the water mixes very little. The approach employed mathematical methods from a field referred to as the ergodic theory. The technique allowed the team to look at the underlying structure of the ocean.
"Instead of using a supercomputer to move zillions of water particles around on the ocean surface, we have built a compact network model that captures the essentials of how the different parts of the ocean are connected," Froyland said.
The model showed parts of the Indian and Pacific Oceans are most closely tied to the South Atlantic while another part of the Indian Ocean belongs in the Pacific.
The take-home message from our work is that we have redefined the borders of the ocean basins according to how the water moves," van Sebille said.
The new technique could help researchers gain insight into ocean ecology and track ocean debris.
The findings were published in the Sept. 2 edition of Chaos: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Nonlinear Science.
