PFAS – perfluoroalkyl substances, a family of more than 5,000 hardy chemicals used to make products ranging from firefighting foam to waterproof mascara – have widely pervaded the U.S. water supply, according to a new study by the private, nonprofit Environmental Working Group (EWG). Several of the chemicals have been linked to liver damage, kidney...
Category: TRENDS IN HI-TECH SCIENCE
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NEW WAY TO CLEAN UP OCEAN PLASTIC
About 16 billion pounds of plastic flows into the world’s oceans each year. In 2021, the Finnish research center VTT will test a way to start taking it out. Scientists there have sorted through the realm of bacteria to choose several strains that can digest various forms of plastic and turn them back into raw...
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WATER-RELATED VIOLENCE INCREASING
Physical confrontations over water have more than doubled over the past ten years, according to the nonprofit Pacific Institute, who are focused on protecting the world’s fresh water. Water became a weapon in Syria’s civil war as government forces damaged a water pipeline into the city of Aleppo, leaving millions of people desperately short of...
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VACCINE AGAINST ALZHEIMER’S
In a test, a vaccine has cleared the brain protein tangles and build-ups that characterize Alzheimer’s disease. Researchers at the University of California and the Institute for Molecular Medicine genetically engineered mice to develop the tau protein tangles and amyloid protein build-ups that accumulate among brain cells that mark the illness. Previous vaccines had targeted...
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MAKING BUILDING BLOCKS FROM JUNK PLASTIC
The Center for Regenerative Design and Collaboration, a Costa Rica venture, has figured out a way to grind up junk plastic and mix it with concrete to make bricks, cinder blocks, and similar building materials. The waste plastic doesn’t have to be sorted by type. The conglomeration is mixed with minerals to create a plastic-limestone...
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ELECTRIC POWER TO THE PEOPLE
In October, New Hampshire became the latest state to pass a law allowing counties and towns to generate and distribute electricity, following in the steps of Washington, Vermont, and California, among others. This growing “community power” movement pools several motivations. For some, grid power from a centralized utility is too expensive, with rates that increase...
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MICROPARTICLES FIGHT MALNUTRITION
From vitamin B12 in your cereal to iodine in table salt, adding nutrients to food is an old idea. But it doesn’t always work. Long storage, changes in humidity and temperature, and other variables can slash the additives’ potency. That’s a special problem when transporting food to places where famine has taken hold, often in...