Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Marine Pollution Bulletin journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/marpolbul Baseline Anthropoquinas: First description of plastics and other man-made materials in recently formed coastal sedimentary rocks in the southern hemisphere Gerson Fernandino a, ⁎ , Carla I. Elliff b , Heitor Francischini c , Paula Dentzien-Dias d a Centro de Estudos Costeiros, Limnológicos e Marinhos (CECLIMAR), Departamento Interdisciplinar, Campus Litoral Norte, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Av. Tramandaí, 976, 95625-000, Imbé, RS, Brazil b Instituto Oceanográfico, Universidade de São Paulo (IOUSP), Praça do Oceanográfico, 191, 05508-120 São Paulo, SP, Brazil c Departamento de Paleontologia e Estratigrafia, Instituto de Geociências, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). Av. Bento Gonçalves, 9500, 90540-000, Porto Alegre, RS, Brazil d Laboratório de Geologia e Paleontologia, Instituto de Oceanografia, Universidade Federal de Rio Grande (FURG), Campus Carreiros, Av. Itália, s/n - Km 8 - Carreiros, 96203-900 Rio Grande, RS, Brazil ARTICLE INFO Keywords: Anthropocene Geodiversity Marine litter Plastic pollution Southern Brazil ABSTRACT Plastic, as a “flagship species”, represents how deeply humans impact the environment. Although scarce, the presence of plastic and other anthropogenic materials in rocks has already been reported in the literature, however, so far, not in the Southern Hemisphere. Thus, the objective of the present study was to report and describe samples of sedimentary rocks containing anthropogenic items cemented with biogenic and siliciclastic material – anthropoquinas – and to discuss implications to the establishment of the Anthropocene and geodi- versity conservation. Six samples of anthropoquinas were evaluated, presenting different technofossils (metal bottle caps, ship nail, plastic earring and plastic fragment) and composition (lithic and biogenic fragments). Energy Dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy was conducted on two samples, reflecting differences regarding their genesis. The description of these rocks is concerning and reflects how deeply human behavior influences various natural compartments. Therefore, studies on the effects of marine litter on geodiversity are strongly encouraged. 1. Introduction One of the main impacts from human activities and our cultural behavior is the production of solid waste and the consequent environ- mental pollution caused by unsuitable disposal worldwide (Pereira and Fernandino, 2019). An estimated 2.01 billion tons of waste is produced every year (Kaza et al., 2018), a large portion of which is composed of extremely durable materials, such as plastic. In fact, plastic is con- sidered the most common item found in debris surveys in coastal and marine environments. It can be found in virtually every single beach, ocean and seafloor in the world, regardless how far from urban settle- ments these places are (e.g. Convey et al., 2002; Chiba et al., 2018). Thus, this material can be considered as a “flagship species”: a species that acts as an ambassador to arise public interest and sympathy (Simberloff, 1998). Although the term is commonly used for animals – usually large vertebrates – applying it to plastic pollution as an analogy seems appropriate, since plastic litter is commonly used to represent how deeply humans can impact the environment, especially the oceans. However, the abiotic portion of the planet's natural resources and the impacts that they are submitted to are rarely considered in en- vironmental strategies (Gray, 2011). Nevertheless, plastics and other man-made materials have been shown to impact the geological com- partment of nature. Some authors have argued that plastic particles are now part of the sediment matrix, becoming an anthropogenic compo- nent of marine and continental sediments (e.g. Fernandino et al., 2016; Zalasiewicz et al., 2016). Therefore, the record of these particles in future sedimentary rocks is, at least, reasonable to consider. The idea of plastics as a component of the sedimentary cycle is re- cent, and still presents scarce evidence from the field. Corcoran et al. (2014) found what they called a “plastiglomerate”, which is the first partly plastic “rock” described. Plastiglomerates are a mixture of geo- logic (i.e. volcanic rock fragments and sand), biological (i.e. coral skeletons, shells and woody material) and anthropogenic (plastic) ma- terial, molten together by campfires. Similarly, Turner et al. (2019) described rounded “pebbles” found in Cornwall formed by the burning of waste and eroded by hydrodynamic processes. On the other hand, Irabien et al. (2015) found plastic cemented in (anthropogenic) bea- chrocks in the Basque Country (Spain), in a carbonate-rich https://doi.org/10.1016/j.marpolbul.2020.111044 Received 20 January 2020; Received in revised form 27 February 2020; Accepted 2 March 2020 ⁎ Corresponding author. E-mail address: gerson.fernandino@ufrgs.br (G. Fernandino). Marine Pollution Bulletin 154 (2020) 111044 Available online 10 March 2020 0025-326X/ © 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. T