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The project, part of the ESA Discovery Campaign on Remote Sensing of Plastic Marine Litter, developed a method to estimate floating macroplastic accumulation and transport rates in rivers using remote sensing. It combined the detection of floating water hyacinths using Sentinel-2 and Sentinel-1 with in-situ estimates of macroplastic densities carried by this invasive aquatic weed. Water hyacinths typically form large patches of several meters of width and length, and can thus be detected from space.

Recent studies have shown that remote sensing of floating marine plastic litter (MPL) is feasible from unmanned aerial systems, aircraft and satellite missions. However, in the infrared (IR) spectrum, water is a strong light absorber which makes the spectral detection and discrimination of plastics challenging. Additionally, MPL is often covered with living organisms and it is unclear what impact different thickness of biofouling may have on the spectral reflectance of floating plastic.

In the ocean, transport and mixing processes tend to disperse matter in suspension over wide spatial (~100 km) and long temporal (~month) scales. Fronts appear at the boundary between water masses with different properties and are caused by diverse oceanic features and processes, including bottom topography. Frontal structures include tidal mixing fronts, shelf-break fronts, upwelling fronts, estuarine fronts, plume fronts, fronts generated by convergence or divergence of water masses, and frontal eddies (Acha et al. 2015; Largier 1993).

In order to enable lunar exploration in a sustainable manner, it is necessary to develop technologies that allow the use of lunar resources in-situ. Additive manufacturing techniques are being studied for in-situ resources utilization on the Moon (e.g.: solar or laser sintering). The results of these studies, presented samples with low mechanical properties due to the formation of defects and cracks within the final product.