The tiny pieces of plastic that synthetic clothes shed when washed and car tires leave behind on roadways as they wear are making their way into the seafood people eat, according to a new study by Portland State University (PSU) researchers.

For the study published in Frontiers in Toxicology, the researchers from PSU’s Applied Coastal Ecology Lab examined particle pollution in six commonly eaten West Coast seafood species: black rockfish, Chinook salmon, lingcod, Pacific herring, Pacific lamprey and pink shrimp.