99 percent of the plastic pollution in the ocean is missing; this has been reported by a 400-strong team that was set out to comprehensively measure the amount of human-produced waste in the oceans. It was expected that millions of tons of plastic will be found out polluting the surface of the ocean but instead only 40,000 tons was determined.

The theories that judge this reduced amount are very disturbing. Some say that the marine animal are most likely eating the plastic fragments, this could be of great concern as this would mean that toxic ocean pollutants are attaching themselves to the plastic that fish then eat and pass it up in the food chain that includes humans too. Also, it means that vast amounts of plastic is being deposited on the ocean floor and is causing damage to the ecosystem.

All these finding were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The scientific reason behind no significant increase in the amount of plastic in ocean since 1980s is that the sunlight causes the plastics floating in the oceans to break down into microscopic fragments.

"Ocean currents carry plastic objects, which split into smaller and smaller fragments due to solar radiation. Those little pieces of plastic, known as microplastics, can last hundreds of years and were detected in 88 percent of the ocean surface sampled", said Andrés Cozar, a researcher from Spain's University of Cadiz and one of the team's leaders.

Fishes may mistake the small bits of plastic for zooplankton and blot themselves up by eating it. Later this plastic will go deeper in the ocean due to excretion or as the fish dies.

The Oregon State University ocean ecologist Angelicque White said that there is still a lot left to learn about the way plastic functions in the sea water.