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There are now at least five major garbage patches in the world's oceans, and much of that trash is plastic.
全世界的大洋中现在至少有五大主要垃圾区域，而且其中绝大多数是塑料垃圾。
But last month researchers said they can only account for one percent of the plastic they'd expect to find in the oceans.
但是上个月研究人员称他们只能找到海洋中百分之一的塑料。
So, where'd the rest of it go?
那剩下的都去哪了呢?
Well, animals eat some of it.
好吧，动物们会吃掉一些。
Plastic has been found in turtles, seabirds, fish, plankton, shellfish, even bottom-feeding invertebrates.
我们可以在乌龟，海鸟，鱼类，浮游生物，贝类，甚至无脊椎动物身体里发现塑料。
But there's another way sea creatures might be accumulating plastic:
但是也有另外一种方法，
by sucking up tiny plastic particles with their siphons and gills.
那就是海洋生物可以利用其虹管和鱼鳃吸收微小的塑料颗粒来积累塑料。
Researchers added common shore crabs—Carcinus maenas—to tanks of seawater containing millions of tiny plastic particles, just 10 microns in diameter.
研究人员还表示常见的食草蟹—青蟹身体里所储备的海水中含有成千上万的塑料粒子，直径只有10微米。
After 16 hours, all the crabs had plastic lodged in their gills.
16个小时后，在它们的腮部都会留存有塑料微粒。
And the particles stuck around for up to three weeks, too.
而且这些微粒会停留3周。
The results are in the journal Environmental Science and Technology.
这项研究结果已经在《科学与技术》杂志上发表。
The longer plastic sits in an animal, researchers say, the better the chances it will travel up the food chain.
塑料在动物身体内时间越长，就越有可能回到食物链中。
Meaning all our plastic waste could come back to bite us—or rather be bitten by us.
这就意味着，我们所扔掉的塑料垃圾可能会反咬我们一口，或者说会被我们食用。
"Of course we eat mussels whole, without the shells.
“当然我们可以吃贻贝只吃肉，不食壳。
But we're potentially eating plastic, if they're from a site where there's plastic present."
但如果它们是来自一个塑料垃圾堆积的海域，我们很可能就会进食塑料。”
Lead researcher Andrew Watts, of the University of Exeter.
埃克塞特大学的首席研究员安德鲁瓦特说道。
"We don't know how much plastic we have in our stomachs… chances are we do have some."
“我不知道自己胃里会存多少塑料…我们确实可能吃进去一些。”
