articles

The presence of microplastics in our wastewater can be attributed primarily to two factors. Firstly, many cosmetic products, such as toothpaste, creams, shower gels, and peelings, contain tiny pieces of plastic in order to achieve a mechanical cleaning effect. Secondly, microplastics are washed out in the process of washing polymer textile clothing, and thus they enter our environment via wastewater.

Many researchers who have recently studied nanoparticles are now also investigating microplastics. They include Bernd Nowack, Edgar Hernandez, and Denise Mitrano (who is now working at the water research institute Eawag) from Empa's "Technology and Society" department. On the basis of their nanoparticle research, these three researchers recently published a first quantitative investigation of the release of microfibers from polyester textiles during washing, in the specialist journal "Environmental Science and Technology". In this study, the Empa team primarily investigated the ways in which washing agents, water temperature, and the number and length of wash cycles affect the release of microfibers.

Loving pandas isn’t just a feel-good activity. Recent Michigan State University (MSU) work shows China’s decades of defending panda turf have been good not just for the beloved bears, but also protects habitat for other valuable plants and animals, boosts biodiversity and fights climate change.

In the year 2100, 2 billion people – about one-fifth of the world’s population – could become climate change refugees due to rising ocean levels. Those who once lived on coastlines will face displacement and resettlement bottlenecks as they seek habitable places inland, according to Cornell University research.

“We’re going to have more people on less land and sooner that we think,” said lead author Charles Geisler, professor emeritus of development sociology at Cornell. “The future rise in global mean sea level probably won’t be gradual. Yet few policy makers are taking stock of the significant barriers to entry that coastal climate refugees, like other refugees, will encounter when they migrate to higher ground.”

Researchers have more evidence that males and females are different, this time in the fluid that helps protect the cartilage in their knee joints.

They have found in the synovial fluid of this joint, clear differences in the messages cells are sending and receiving via tiny pieces of RNA, called microRNA, in males and females with the common and debilitating condition osteoarthritis.

Using an off-the-shelf camera flash, researchers turned an ordinary sheet of graphene oxide into a material that bends when exposed to moisture. They then used this material to make a spider-like crawler and claw robot that move in response to changing humidity without the need for any external power.

“The development of smart materials such as moisture-responsive graphene oxide is of great importance to automation and robotics,” said Yong-Lai Zhang of Jilin University, China, and leader of the research team. “Our very simple method for making typical graphene oxides smart is also extremely efficient. A sheet can be prepared within one second.”