Dr. Sarah-Jeanne Royer , PhD

Dr. Sarah-Jeanne Royer is an oceanographer and a specialist on plastic degradation in the oceanic environment. She is currently working on this problem at Hawai’i Pacific University on the Island of Oahu in collaboration with Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego. Dr. Royer’s research focuses on common polymers including synthetic microfibers and their degradation times in the environment. She also investigates the different sources and sinks that connect plastic to the ocean such as the impact of the fishing industry with respect to the total mass balance of plastic discarded in the ocean.  Prior to this work, Dr. Royer investigated the emissions of greenhouse gases from plastics in the environment at the Center for Microbial Oceanography, Research and Education. She also worked with Prof. Nikolai Maximenko on marine debris at the International Pacific Research Center at the University of Hawaii where her research was linked to the pathways and fate of marine debris and plastic accumulation in the ocean in relation with the North Pacific Garbage Patch.  For more than a decade now, she has been working with several organizations to share her science, bring awareness to the growing issue of plastic in the environment and organized several educational workshops. Dr. Royer has been highly involved with the organization named Sustainable Coastlines Hawaii, which is the biggest organization of beach cleanups in Hawaii. For five years she served as their science advisor and started using data collection from volunteers for citizen science projects. She is now the science advisor for Parley for the Oceans and works closely on related science topics with The Ocean Cleanup.  Dr. Royer’s goal is to pursue plastic research to better understand the degradation and fragmentation processes of plastic and fate in the ocean in addition to the plastic accumulation on the different islands of Hawai’i. Her long-last objective is for policymakers to use data from scientists and volunteers to design better laws and policies to reduce plastic production & consumption.