Human Interest Great Pacific Garbage Patch Is Now So Vast That Sea Creatures Have Turned It Into a Home A study published in Nature Ecology & Evolution found 484 marine invertebrates accounting for 46 different species in the "garbage vortex" that floats between California and Hawaii By Anna Lazarus Caplan Anna Lazarus Caplan Anna Lazarus Caplan is a writer-reporter for PEOPLE. She has been working at PEOPLE since 2022. Her work previously appeared in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, The Dallas Morning News, Eater and other publications. People Editorial Guidelines Published on April 18, 2023 11:05AM EDT Close Photo: The Ocean Cleanup The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is now flourishing with marine life. On Monday, scientists revealed that a diverse array of coastal species are thriving in a "floating community composition," which is estimated to be two times the size of Texas. Researchers also identified 484 marine invertebrates accounting for 46 different species inside the giant swath of debris, which floats between California and Hawaii — 80% of which are usually found in coastal habitats, the study published in Nature Ecology & Evolution noted. "It was surprising to see how frequent the coastal species were," Linsey Haram, a science fellow at the National Institute of Food and Agriculture and the study's lead author, told CNN. "They were on 70% of the debris that we found." "Quite a large percentage of the diversity that we found were coastal species and not the native pelagic open ocean species that we were largely expecting to find," she added. Whales Have Been Spotted Swimming in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch for the First Time The Ocean Cleanup Spinning circular currents keep the garbage within the bounds of its sprawling 600,000-plus-square-mile area, per CNN. While there are at least five garbage patches in the world, the Great Pacific patch contains the most plastic, according to USA Today. This isn't the first time that life has been found inside floating debris. In 2019, researchers spotted whales swimming through the sea of plastic garbage. Stanford Sophomore Has a Simple Solution to Water Scarcity: 'Recycling Water Is Easy' "It is well known that ocean plastics pose a threat to marine mammals, with many cases of entanglement and ingestion interactions being recorded worldwide," the study noted at the time. "Here, we describe the first cetacean sightings made within the so-called Great Pacific Garbage Patch." A garbage collector floating through the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The Ocean Clean UP Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from juicy celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. As for the more recent discoveries, scientists are still unraveling the mysteries of what one researcher calls a "garbage vortex." "There's likely competition for space, because space is at a premium in the open ocean, there's likely competition for food resources – but they may also be eating each other," Haram said. "It's hard to know exactly what's going on, but we have seen evidence of some of the coastal anemones eating open ocean species, so we know there is some predation going on between the two communities."