Plastic ‘fingerprints’ spotted from space on remote Aussie beach
Guffogg’s team taught computers to differentiate between the “fingerprints” of plastic and sand, with concentrations of plastic then highlighted with colour in images taken by satellites.
Video transcript
Plastic rubbish on earth can now be seen from space.
Until now, one of the most abundant creations of humankind has been very hard to spot, with satellite technology only being able to survey it in the oceans.
Tracking it on beaches was more difficult as computers were misclassifying shadows and water as plastic.
But by analysing how sand and plastic reflect light differently, scientists from RMIT University revealed that beaches covered in 5 to 10% plastic are now identifiable.
Study lead author Dr Jenna Gig told Yahoo News Australia.
Everything on the surface of the Earth has a unique fingerprint and that fingerprint is made out of light.
We can see some of that light, but we can't see all of it and satellites can see a lot more than we can.
Scuff's team taught computers to differentiate between the fingerprints of plastic and sand with concentrations of plastic, then highlighted with colour in images taken by satellites, she said.
Scientists think that there's almost the same number of individual pieces of plastic in our oceans as there are stars in our Milky Way, and that number is around five trillion, so it's a huge problem we're facing
