How bad is Earth’s microplastics problem? An explorer is on a mission to 7 remote places to find out

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1. Crouched low in one of the coldest, remotest places on Earth, [polar explorer Alan Chambers](https://www.cnn.com/2025/07/01/science/explorer-world-remote-nanoplastics-scli-intl?utm_medium=social&utm_source=reddit) searched for an invisible threat.

   Traveling with fellow former Royal Marine Dave Thomas, he had spent two long months skiing 715 miles (1,151 kilometers) — completely unassisted — from the Hercules Inlet on the coast of Antarctica to the geographic South Pole. The pair hauled a sled heavily loaded with supplies and equipment, as well an extra one for snow samples, all while battling high winds, bitter temperatures and disorientating whiteouts.

   “I built a specialist sledge with a perfectly crafted insert inside,” Chambers explained. “Each evening I’d get on my hands and knees, lay on my belly upwind from the camp and scrape the snow at minus 35 to fill the tins, which we then logged and photographed.”

   That effort, which wrapped in January 2024, was Chambers’ first expedition in a partnership with leading climate scientists at Columbia University to map the spread of microplastics and nanoplastics across the globe. Ultimately, he plans to visit seven of the world’s most remote places to collect earth, sand, snow, water, permafrost and riverbed silt, which experts will then analyze to determine how pervasive plastic waste is.

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