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Air pollution in the Indian capital of Delhi has reached extraordinarily high levels, equivalent to smoking two packs of cigarettes a day, the nation’s doctors and public health experts warned this week.

The billowing stainless steel forms of Frank Gehry’s Pritzker bandshell seem to float up from behind the 3.5-acre Lurie Garden in Millennium Park, backed by Chicago’s celebrated skyline. Another landmark in a city long a laboratory for innovation in architecture and landscaping, the garden has been called a “model of responsible horticulture.” Masses of flowering perennials and grasses are a striking counterpoint to the surrounding walls of concrete and glass. Perhaps most unexpected, at a place that sits atop a 4,000-vehicle underground parking garage and railroad depot in the inner city, are the bees that flit from flower to flower.

Simple technologies can be learned effectively through imitation, while complex methods require professional training. If Ghanaian pineapple farmers are to achieve higher yields through more sustainable agriculture, they will need to be trained in exactly these types of complex applications. This was the conclusion reached by a team from the Technical University of Munich (TUM) and the Kiel Institute for the World Economy (ifW), who provide evidence for this assertion in the form of a new study with recommendations.

Drought is the world’s costliest natural disaster. To monitor, detect and quantify drought, many drought indices have been developed. Previous studies have shown that different indices can yield diverse results for a specific drought event, and a drought index can also give different results depending on the method used for the calculation of potential evapotranspiration (PET).

Significant financial stress is associated with a 13-fold higher odds of having a heart attack, according to research presented at the 18th Annual Congress of the South African Heart Association.