Pollution plastic and tissue bank on stranded seabirds from the Seabil project 2021-2024

The LIFE SeaBiL Project “Saving SeaBirds from marine Litter” intends to evaluate and reduce the impact of plastic pollution on seabirds in 3 countries (France, Spain and Portugal). Partners in this project are the Ligue de Protection des Oiseaux (LPO), LIENSs/La Rochelle University, University of Cadix (UCA), la Sociedad Española de Ornitología/Birdlife (SEO) and Sociedade Portuguesa para o Estudo das Aves (SPEA). A transnational monitoring network has been set up to collect stranded seabirds and store them in care centers. A tissue bank was set up from birds collected and necropsied in order to analyze the impact of plastic pollution through the presence of micro- and mesoplastics in their bodies. This tissue bank brings together biological samples (various matrices - blood, feathers, internal organs) collected at different spatial scales on the French, Spanish and Portuguese coasts. It is intended to be open to the international research community, which will be able to draw on it to carry out various studies on seabirds.