In the eggshells of gulls that live off the southern coast of Great Britain, ecologists have discovered phthalates, plasticizers that are used in the manufacture of plastics. An article describing the study was published by the scientific journal Marine Pollution Bulletin.
“Our observations show that mother seagulls pass on to their offspring not only useful nutrients, but also phthalates and toxic products of their interactions with fats. In particular, the eggs most contaminated with plasticizers turned out to be quite low in vitamin E and a lot of damaged fat molecules,” – said one of the authors of the work, professor at the University of Exeter John Blount.
Each year, approximately 300 million tons of plastic waste ends up in wastewater and landfills. Most of it does not decompose and remains almost intact for tens and even hundreds of years. Blount and his colleagues found that the accumulation of plastic debris in the oceans negatively affected the UK coastal ecosystems. They came to this conclusion by studying the chemical composition of the eggshells of gulls that live in the vicinity of the city of Cornwall in the southwest of England.
Scientists collected 13 seagull eggs from different clutches and studied the structure of their shell, its chemical composition, the contents of the protein and yolk. In all eggs, scientists found a significant amount of phthalates – phthalic acid esters. These compounds are widely used in industry to increase the flexibility, transparency and durability of plastic.
Phthalates can accumulate in the body of humans and animals and interact with fats there, resulting in the formation of toxic compounds. Therefore, the production and use of phthalates in many countries of Europe, Canada and other countries of the first world have been gradually phased out for several years.
So far, scientists cannot say for sure how phthalates got into the body of seagulls. This could happen both indirectly, together with the fish being eaten, or directly, if the birds swallowed plastic fragments. At the same time, Blount and his colleagues note that the ingress of phthalates into the shell, yolk and egg whites significantly reduced their viability, including by reducing the reserves of nutrients that the embryo uses for growth. This once again shows that it is necessary to reduce the volume of plastic emissions into the ocean and clean it from the already existing debris, the researchers concluded.
