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Zooplankton, phytoplankton and pervasive anthropogenic particles along a zonal North Atlantic transect: a multi-vessel citizen-science image survey
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Citizen-science sailors crossing the North Atlantic filtered surface seawater and found surprisingly little zooplankton (the tiny animals that anchor the ocean food web) but lots of plastic particles, plastic fibers, and soot-like carbon specks. While the plastic-vs-algae identifications still need lab confirmation, the findings add to growing evidence that plastic pollution is widespread in the open ocean, the same waters that produce seafood many people eat, and that shifts in tiny marine life could ripple up the food chain.
This version adds the post-submission audit files: the eye-check source manifest with its matching scripts, the archive-wide large-organism scan, specimen images of the shrimps and copepods reported in Sect. 2.3 of the revised manuscript, and the updated Figure 1 map marking the find stations v3. Adds the curated image archive: 1,225 sample micrographs in eight per-vessel zips, with the per-particle size and class table (sizes.tsv) underlying Figure 4 of the revised manuscript. The record now contains the images, the analysis pipeline and its outputs, so every number in the manuscript can be reproduced from this record alone. Version 2 adds GOES_image_audit_package.zip, a complete reproducible re-analysis of the filter-image archive which supersedes the zooplankton class of GOES_ALL_DATA.xlsx This dataset contains the complete observational data underlying the study "Near-absence of surface zooplankton and pervasive anthropogenic particles along a zonal North Atlantic transect: a multi-vessel citizen-science image survey" (Dryden, Duncan & the GOES Foundation citizen-science consortium; submitted to Ocean Science, Copernicus; manuscript egusphere-2026-3979). Between 8 January and 3 February 2022, eight sailing vessels crossing the trade-wind North Atlantic (from the Canary Islands and Cape Verde to the Caribbean and Suriname) collected surface water samples on a fixed twice-daily schedule using a standardised 0.5-litre cartridge filter (20 µm). Each filter was photographed under a common microscope design at a 5 mm field of view, and an automated OpenCV image pipeline located the filter apertures, sized every particle larger than 20 µm, and classified it as zooplankton, phytoplankton, plastic particle, plastic fibre, black (combustion) carbon, or unidentified. In total the pipeline sized and classified 51,547 particles across 352 georeferenced surface stations. One vessel (Emma) additionally sampled a higher-latitude North Atlantic return leg in May 2023. Surface net-tow validation (120 µm mesh, day and night) was carried out independently in the mid-Atlantic. The workbook (GOES_ALL_DATA.xlsx) contains seven sheets: Summary — headline metrics for the survey (particle totals, station counts, class detection frequencies). By boat — per-vessel particle-class counts, number of stations, and the percentage of stations at which each class was detected. Image per-station (all boats) — the 352 sampled stations, with vessel, region, leg, sample identifier, latitude, longitude, per-class image counts, image total, and number of filter holes imaged. Copepod geotagged per-image — the 110 GPS-tagged images from the Copepod reference crossing, with image identifier, date-time, position, and per-class counts. Size classes by category — particle counts for each class binned into 20–200, 200–1000, and >1000 µm size ranges. Every particle size — the full particle-level inventory: one row per particle (51,547 rows), giving vessel, leg, latitude, longitude, class (category), maximum dimension in micrometres (size_um), and size class. Crew-logged counts — the volunteer crews' own hand-logged particle counts by station, provided for transparency. Notes on interpretation: identifications derive from citizen-science microscopy. The plastic-versus-phytoplankton partition is provisional pending FTIR/Raman confirmation, and "black carbon" is an optical description (dark, colourless particles) that may also include sediment, shadow, or dark plastic. The crew hand-logs (sheet 7) are qualitative context and are not used in the quantitative analysis, which rests on the automated image pipeline (sheets 2–6) and the independent net tow. Positions are from image GPS for the geotagged subset and from field logs otherwise.
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Near-absence of surface zooplankton and pervasive anthropogenic particles along a zonal North Atlantic transect: a multi-vessel citizen-science image survey
AI summary Read the abstract
Volunteer sailors crossing the North Atlantic Ocean collected water samples and found something alarming: tiny ocean creatures called zooplankton (a key food source for fish and whales) were almost completely missing from the surface water, while plastic particles and fibers showed up almost everywhere. This matters because zooplankton sit at the base of the ocean food chain, and their disappearance—paired with widespread plastic pollution—raises concerns about the health of marine ecosystems that ultimately supply much of the seafood people eat. The findings are preliminary (some plastic identifications still need lab confirmation), but they suggest
Zooplankton, phytoplankton and pervasive anthropogenic particles along a zonal North Atlantic transect: a multi-vessel citizen-science image survey
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Volunteer sailors crossing the Atlantic Ocean collected water samples, finding plastic fibers and particles mixed throughout, alongside plankton, at nearly every stop. This citizen-science approach shows just how widespread ocean microplastic pollution really is, a reminder that these particles, which can enter our food chain through seafood, are essentially everywhere in the open ocean, not just near coastlines.
Near-absence of surface zooplankton and pervasive anthropogenic particles along a zonal North Atlantic transect: a multi-vessel citizen-science image survey
AI summary Read the abstract
Volunteer sailors crossing the North Atlantic on eight boats found something startling: tiny ocean animals called zooplankton — a key food source for fish — were almost completely missing from surface waters, while man-made particles like plastic bits, fibers, and soot showed up almost everywhere they looked. This matters because zooplankton sit at the base of the ocean food chain, so their scarcity alongside widespread plastic pollution raises concerns about the health of the fish we eventually eat and the broader marine ecosystem we depend on. That said, this was a citizen-science project with some particles still needing lab confirmation, so it
Zooplankton, phytoplankton and pervasive anthropogenic particles along a zonal North Atlantic transect: a multi-vessel citizen-science image survey
AI summary Read the abstract
Volunteer sailors crossing the Atlantic Ocean collected water samples twice daily, revealing that tiny plastic particles and fibers are widespread even in remote open ocean waters, alongside plankton. This citizen-science approach shows how everyday people can help track ocean plastic pollution, the same pollution that ultimately makes its way into seafood and, potentially, our bodies.
Zooplankton, phytoplankton and pervasive anthropogenic particles along a zonal North Atlantic transect: a multi-vessel citizen-science image survey
AI summary Read the abstract
Volunteer sailors crossing the Atlantic Ocean collected water samples and photographed thousands of tiny particles, finding that plastic bits and fibers were mixed in with natural plankton nearly everywhere they looked. This citizen-science approach shows how ordinary people can help track ocean plastic pollution, though confirming exactly which particles are plastic still needs lab testing.
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