Pollution
- Environment
Natural acids in soil could protect rice from toxic nanoparticles
A common component of dirt makes toxic copper oxide nanoparticles less harmful to rice plants.
- Environment
Oil from BP spill probably sprayed out in tiny drops
Oil that gushed from the well in the 2010 Deepwater Horizon spill may have shattered into tiny droplets, with high pressures doing the work of dispersants.
- Science & Society
One anniversary to celebrate, one to contemplate
In this issue, both feature articles focus on anniversaries, though of two very different kinds.
- Environment
Controversial insecticide use rises as farmers douse seeds
Use of neonicotinoids, a class of controversial insecticides, has risen dramatically, posing threat to pollinating insects.
- Environment
Five years on, Deepwater Horizon oil spill’s impact lingers
Five years after the Gulf of Mexico’s largest disaster, researchers are still studying its ecological impact and struggling to learn the fate of most of the spilled oil.
- Environment
Tampons: Not just for feminine hygiene
Tampons soaked in polluted water glow under UV light, revealing detergent-filled wastewater in rivers.
- Materials Science
Suds turn silver nanoparticles in clothes into duds
Bleach-containing detergents destroy antibacterial silver nanoparticles that coat clothes.
- Environment
Manganese turns honeybees into bumbling foragers
Ingesting low doses of the heavy metal manganese disrupts honeybee foraging, a new experiment suggests.
- Health & Medicine
Stoplights are hot spots for airborne pollution
Drivers get a big chunk of their exposure to pollutants from short stops at traffic intersections.
- Health & Medicine
Fallout from nuclear bomb testing presaged today’s radioactive tracers
Scientists in 1965 measured buildup of radioactive carbon from nuclear bomb testing in people.
- Environment
Humans’ environmental rap sheet gets longer
Ice cores reveal human-caused air pollution 240 years before the Industrial Revolution.
- Environment
Funding canceled for clean coal plant
The Department of Energy has scrapped funding for FutureGen, a project to use new technology to sequester carbon dioxide emissions from a coal power plant.
