Examination of the presence of microplastics in wild Magellanic penguins from Punta Tombo, Argentina via fecal analysis

WALKER, B.; D'AMICO, V.; BERTELLOTTI, M.

Viña del Mar

Congreso; 11th International Penguin Congress; 2023

Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile

Microplastics, synthetic fibers less than 5 mm in length, have become a hot topic in the media recently as they have been discovered in human blood and placenta. This relatively new field of research has focused a lot on quantifying microplastics in all areas of the environment, especially in marine habitats. There are very few papers examining microplastics in wild penguins, and even fewer that examine microplastics in penguin chicks. The goal of this project is to expand the field of microplastic research to wild adult and chick penguins. Fibers were analyzed from 50 Magellanic penguin chick and 90 Magellanic penguin adult fecal samples collected in Punta Tombo, Argentina. Both groups followed a digestion, density separation, and filtration protocol, however, the digestion and density separate steps were flipped for the wild adult samples due to increased amounts of sand and rocks. From the 50 chick fecal samples analyzed, 222 fibers have been identified and described based on their color and size. Microplastics have been identified in numerous samples, including identifications such as polyester (PET), polyethylene, and polypropylene. Quantification and identification of fibers from the 90 adult fecal samples will be reported on in the near future. The results of this study will help us to understand the relationship between microplastics in adult and penguin chicks in the wild, and these methods can be used for dirty biological samples in future research investigations.