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Topic Summary

Posted by: Schwartze Katze
« on: February 29, 2024, 11:01:09 am »

Microplastics found in every human placenta tested in study
Quote
Scientists express concern over health impacts, with another study finding particles in arteries
Quote
Microplastics have been found in every human placenta tested in a study, leaving the researchers worried about the potential health impacts on developing foetuses.

The scientists analysed 62 placental tissue samples and found the most common plastic detected was polyethylene, which is used to make plastic bags and bottles. A second study revealed microplastics in all 17 human arteries tested and suggested the particles may be linked to clogging of the blood vessels.

Microplastics have also recently been discovered in human blood and breast milk, indicating widespread contamination of people’s bodies. The impact on health is as yet unknown but microplastics have been shown to cause damage to human cells in the laboratory. The particles could lodge in tissue and cause inflammation, as air pollution particles do, or chemicals in the plastics could cause harm.

Huge amounts of plastic waste are dumped in the environment and microplastics have polluted the entire planet, from the summit of Mount Everest to the deepest oceans. People are known to consume the tiny particles via food and water as well as breathing them in, and they have been found in the faeces of babies and adults.

Prof Matthew Campen, at the University of New Mexico, US, who led the research, said: “If we are seeing effects on placentas, then all mammalian life on this planet could be impacted. That’s not good.”

He said the growing concentration of microplastics in human tissue could explain puzzling increases in some health problems, including inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), colon cancer in people under 50, and declining sperm counts. A 2021 study found people with IBD had 50% more microplastics in their faeces.

Campen said he was deeply concerned by the growing global production of plastics because it meant the problem of microplastics in the environment “is only getting worse”.

The research, published in the Toxicological Sciences journal, found microplastics in all the placenta samples tested, with concentrations ranging from 6.5 to 790 micrograms per gram of tissue. PVC and nylon were the most common plastics detected, after polyethylene...
Entire article: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/feb/27/microplastics-found-every-human-placenta-tested-study-health-impact
Posted by: 90sRetroFan
« on: February 18, 2024, 11:05:34 pm »

https://us.yahoo.com/news/tennessee-elementary-students-teacher-hospitalized-211606061.html

Quote
Tennessee elementary students, teacher, hospitalized after science experiment involving dry ice
...
A Gallatin, Tennessee elementary school science experiment involving dry ice resulted in 18 students and a teacher being sent to the hospital on Friday morning, according to district officials.
...
Immediately following the experiment, several students reported being nauseous and went to see the school nurse, who then told administrators about the situation.
...
Over the next 30 minutes, additional students began experiencing nauseous conditions.
...
Dry ice is carbon dioxide in solid form and poses a risk if it melts in a space that is not ventilated well and inhaled.

Which one and only one civilization is to blame for dry ice? Answer: the same one as usual.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dry_ice#History

Quote
dry ice was first observed in 1835 by French inventor Adrien-Jean-Pierre Thilorier (1790–1844), who published the first account of the substance.[7][8] In his experiments, it was noted that when opening the lid of a large cylinder containing liquid carbon dioxide, most of the liquid carbon dioxide quickly evaporated. This left only solid dry ice in the container.

More about dry ice:

Quote
Prolonged exposure to dry ice can cause severe skin damage through frostbite, and the fog produced may also hinder attempts to withdraw from contact in a safe manner. Because it sublimes into large quantities of carbon dioxide gas, which could pose a danger of hypercapnia, dry ice should only be exposed to open air in a well-ventilated environment.[30] For this reason, in the context of laboratory safety dry ice is assigned label precaution P403: "Store in a well ventilated place." Industrial dry ice may contain contaminants that make it unsafe for direct contact with food.[47]
Posted by: 90sRetroFan
« on: December 03, 2023, 04:27:23 pm »

And now camels too:

https://www.yahoo.com/news/scientists-stunned-disturbing-discoveries-during-143000919.html

Quote
Plastic pollution is an enormous global problem, and a lot of focus has been rightly placed on the devastating effects that plastic is having on our oceans and marine life. But plastic pollution on land is a big problem, too, as experts have recently been reminded when they started discovering giant blobs of the stuff inside the stomachs of dead camels.
...
findings showed that plastic clumps called polybezoars, which Eriksen said “range from the size of a basketball to roughly a large suitcase,” are responsible for 1% of the camel deaths in the UAE

“All [camels] know in the desert [is] if it’s not sand, it’s food,” Eriksen said. “If they see a plastic bag stuck in a tree … or stuck against a fence, they might think, ‘Oh, that’s a novel piece of food,’ and they’ll consume it.”
...
The effects of eating plastic are devastating for the camels, causing intestinal blockages, creating lacerations inside their stomachs, and creating a toxic environment for bacteria to grow amid the folds of the plastic.

“It’s a slow death,” Eriksen said. “Imagine if you had five plastic bags crushed up in your body, and maybe a dozen bottle caps and a few straws, and it stayed there for years. I mean, you would suffer until you’d ultimately perish from that ingested trash. And that’s what the camels are experiencing.”

Camels are not the only land animals facing this challenge, either. A sick bear in Colorado was recently euthanized and found to have plastic waste blocking its digestive system. Plastic waste consumption also killed two elephants in Sri Lanka.

Which one and only one civilization is to blame for this?
Posted by: 90sRetroFan
« on: November 22, 2023, 03:19:10 am »

https://us.yahoo.com/news/experts-disturbing-autopsy-discovery-orca-093000466.html

Quote
Experts make disturbing autopsy discovery on orca after missing obvious ‘cry for help’ — here’s why it’s so concerning
...
A necropsy conducted by Brazil’s Orca Institute found a 2.5-foot-long sheet of hard plastic, alongside other plastic debris, in her stomach. This tragic discovery underscores the ongoing crisis of plastic pollution in our oceans.

The orca’s death is not an isolated incident — a sperm whale with a stomach full of plastic washed up in Hawaii recently as well — and is a reminder of the severe impact of plastic pollution on marine life.

According to Newsweek, The International Union for the Conservation of Nature estimates that at least 14 million tons of plastic waste end up in the ocean every year. Researchers from Stanford University further found that some species of whales are ingesting as many as 10 million pieces of microplastic each day.

Large plastics, like the one found in the orca, can block digestive systems, tricking animals into feeling full and leading to starvation.

Hence:

https://trueleft.createaforum.com/true-left-vs-false-left/true-left-breakthrough-ahimsa/msg19875/?topicseen#msg19875

https://trueleft.createaforum.com/true-left-vs-false-left/true-left-breakthrough-ahimsa/msg19993/?topicseen#msg19993

https://trueleft.createaforum.com/true-left-vs-false-left/true-left-breakthrough-ahimsa/msg20624/?topicseen#msg20624
Posted by: 90sRetroFan
« on: November 18, 2023, 09:24:49 pm »

Posted by: Plastic
« on: October 29, 2023, 01:12:44 pm »

Scientists make concerning discovery deep inside cave that’s been closed off for decades
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Cave explorers have sought many things, from treasure to mineral veins to mummies. One group of cave explorers, however, went searching for something much less exciting and potentially far more toxic — microplastics.

What happened?

A recent article in Vice reports that an expedition team of scientists led by Elizabeth Hasenmueller, associate director of the Water Access, Technology, Environment, and Resources (WATER) Institute at Saint Louis University, found high levels of plastic pollution in a Missouri cave system that has been closed to the public for 30 years.

Cliff Cave, a system of passageways near Saint Louis, has been closed to the public for safety and conservation reasons since a fatal flash flood in 1993, per a university report. To explore the system, Hasenmueller and her colleagues were given special permits to extract samples of its water and sediments during day trips in May 2019 and April 2022, according to Vice.

They took samples every 82 feet until they reached as far as they could — about 590 feet from the entrance. They discovered anthropogenic (human-sourced) microplastics, tiny plastic particles less than 5 millimeters (about 0.2 inches) long, at every site they sampled.

“We found anthropogenic microparticles in all samples that were mainly fibers (91%) and clear (59%),” the team wrote in its study, published in ScienceDirect. “Quantities in sediment were ~100 times those in water. These findings indicate that sediment sequesters anthropogenic microparticle pollution in the cave. Microplastic concentrations were similar among all sediment samples, but only one water sample at the main entrance contained microplastics.”

Why is this cave finding concerning?

The team’s discovery suggests that many underground systems like this are likely contaminated by human pollution even in the absence of humans; the pollution poses potential risks to the fragile ecosystems that live in these systems and to human water resources, such as aquifers.

While disturbing, the results aren’t surprising as microplastics flood the environment, potentially endangering humans and animals alike. Microplastics have now been found in places as remote as Arctic air and even in human hearts.

What can be done about microplastic pollution?

Microplastics have permeated nearly every area of Earth, and removing them all will likely be impossible. Scientists are working on ways to remove what they can, but we must also do our part.

The best thing we can do is not contribute more to the pollution by reducing our use of plastic.
Finding alternatives to plastic bottles, straws, and bags is a great place to start. Proper recycling is also key to eliminating microplastic pollution from our environment and bodies.
https://news.yahoo.com/scientists-concerning-discovery-deep-inside-183000082.html

Who is ultimately responsible for microplastic contamination on the planet? This guy:

[WESTERN] MAN
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfGMYdalClU
Posted by: SpaceJunk
« on: October 25, 2023, 01:15:02 pm »

Falling metal space junk is changing Earth's upper atmosphere in ways we don't fully understand
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A research plane that flew through Earth's stratosphere identified more than 20 elements that are linked to the aerospace industry. Experts predict that the problem could become much worse in the future.

The sky is littered with metal pollution from bits of space junk that burn up as they reenter the atmosphere, a new study reveals. This unexpected level of contamination, which will likely rise sharply in the coming decades, could change our planet's atmosphere in ways we still don't fully understand, researchers warn.

The study, published Oct. 16 in the journal PNAS, is part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Stratospheric Aerosol Processes, Budget and Radiative Effects (SABRE) mission, which monitors the levels of aerosols — tiny particles suspended in the air — within the atmosphere.

The team used a research plane, which was fitted with a specialized funnel on its nose cone that captures and analyzes aerosols to sample the stratosphere — the atmosphere's second layer that spans between 7.5 and 31 miles (12 and 50 kilometers) above the planet's surface. The study was designed to detect aerosols covered with "meteor dust" left behind by space rocks that burned up upon entry. Instead, the plane detected high levels of metallic elements contaminating the floating molecules, none of which could be explained by meteors or other natural processes.

The two most surprising elements were niobium and hafnium, which are both rare earth metals used to make technological components such as batteries. The researchers were also puzzled by high levels of aluminum, copper and lithium.

The team had not expected to find these elements in the stratosphere and were initially confused as to where they had come from, study lead author Daniel Murphy, an atmospheric chemist at NOAA's Chemical Sciences Laboratory in Boulder, Colorado, said in a statement. "But the combination of aluminum and copper, plus niobium and hafnium, which are used in heat-resistant, high-performance alloys, pointed us to the aerospace industry," he said.

The discovery "represents the first time that stratospheric pollution has been unquestionably linked to reentry of space debris," researchers wrote in the statement.

In total, the study identified 20 different metallic elements that do not naturally occur in Earth's atmosphere, including silver, iron, lead, magnesium, titanium, beryllium, chromium, nickel and zinc.

The team suspects that the main source of the pollution is rocket boosters that are ejected by rockets shortly after they clear the upper atmosphere, then fall back to Earth.

China, which was previously criticized for a series of uncontrolled reentries, is responsible for many of these rocket booster reentries. However, this problem has also plagued Russia and NASA.

Falling satellites that have been abandoned, knocked out of orbit by solar storms or purposefully crashed back to Earth are also likely to release large amounts of metal pollution as they burn up.

Pollution from satellites will likely increase as more commercial satellites are launched into space. Of particular concern is the nearly 9,000 satellites that are currently in low-Earth orbit, which are all destined to eventually fall back to Earth, according to Orbiting Now.

In total, around 10% of aerosols from the new study were polluted with space junk metals. But the researchers predict that this could jump to around 50% in the next few decades...
https://www.livescience.com/space/space-exploration/falling-metal-space-junk-is-changing-earths-upper-atmosphere-in-ways-we-dont-fully-understand
Posted by: 90sRetroFan
« on: October 07, 2023, 05:30:08 pm »

Western civilization is everywhere contd.:

https://www.yahoo.com/news/forever-chemicals-everywhere-most-common-094512367.html

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Forever chemicals are all around us. Most people ingest or inhale these synthetic chemicals, which include per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), phenols, and parabens, through contaminated water and food — even air. They’re also in our cookware, packaging materials, furniture, clothes and carpets, making them nearly impossible to avoid.

In fact, studies show that nearly everyone has already been exposed to PFAS and has them circulating within their bodies. An estimated 97% of Americans have PFAS in their blood, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
...
Forever chemicals break down slowly and can stay in the body for months or years. “What makes them different and important is that they are toxic, entirely man-made, and can remain in the environment and in the human body for a long time after we put them there,” Scott Bartell, a professor of environmental and occupational health at the University of California, Irvine, told HuffPost.
...
Growing evidence suggests forever chemicals disrupt the endocrine system, meaning they can interfere with the production of hormones like estrogen, testosterone, and thyroid hormones. Hormone dysfunction may be a key component of carcinogenesis, past data suggests.

PFAS also mimic the fatty acids our bodies use for energy, potentially derailing how the body processes lipids. Some public health experts suspect certain PFAS may be neurotoxic and contribute to neurological diseases like Parkinson’s disease. The mechanisms may be unclear, but the association between PFAS and numerous health problems is undeniable.
...
PFAS are everywhere. They coat paper and cardboard food and beverage packaging. They’re in cosmetics — such as waterproof mascara, lipstick and foundation — and personal care products, including lotions, shampoos, shaving creams and body wash. They’re used in flame retardants along with water-resistant and stain-resistant textiles and clothing.

“These chemicals can leach into the food and beverages contained in such packaging or can be absorbed through the skin from personal care products,” Claudio said.

The main route of exposure is through our diet. High levels of PFAS are often identified in fish and shellfish like shrimp and crabs. The most common and most studied culprit: drinking water. A report from the Environmental Working Group found that over 200 million Americans likely have PFAS in their drinking water.

“PFAS are common contaminants in food and water, because they’ve been produced all over the world, and have found their way into the food chain and into many water supplies,” Bartell said.

They were not being produced all over the world for most of history. Which one civilization changed this?
Posted by: 90sRetroFan
« on: October 06, 2023, 05:35:12 pm »

Bird strikes were previously covered here:

https://trueleft.createaforum.com/true-left-vs-right/western-civilization-is-a-health-hazard/msg39/#msg39

Latest example:

https://www.yahoo.com/news/nearly-1-000-migrating-songbirds-194123876.html



Quote
Nearly 1,000 migrating songbirds perish after crashing into windows at Chicago exhibition hall
...
“It was just like a carpet of dead birds at the windows there,” said Willard, a retired bird division collections manager at the Chicago Field Museum, where his duties included administering, preserving and cataloging the museum's collection of 500,000 bird specimens as well as searching for bird strikes as part of migration research.

“A normal night would be zero to 15 (dead) birds. It was just kind of a shocking outlier to what we've experienced," Willard said. "In 40 years of keeping track of what's happening at McCormick, we've never seen anything remotely on that scale."

Researchers estimate hundreds of millions of birds die in window strikes in the United States each year. Scientists with the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service released a study in 2014 that put the number between 365 million and 988 million birds annually.

Window strikes are an issue in almost every major U.S. city. Birds don't see clear or reflective glass and don't understand it's a lethal barrier. When they see plants or bushes through windows or reflected in them, they head for them, killing themselves in the process.

Which civilization introduced reflective glass to the world?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror#History

Quote
During the early Europe Renaissance, a fire-gilding technique developed to produce an even and highly reflective tin coating for glass mirrors. The back of the glass was coated with a tin-mercury amalgam, and the mercury was then evaporated by heating the piece. This process caused less thermal shock to the glass than the older molten-lead method.[15]: p.16  The date and location of the discovery is unknown, but by the 16th century Venice was a center of mirror production using this technique. These Venetian mirrors were up to 40 inches (100 cm) square.
...
The invention of the ribbon machine in the late Industrial Revolution allowed modern glass panes to be produced in bulk.[15] The Saint-Gobain factory, founded by royal initiative in France, was an important manufacturer, and Bohemian and German glass, often rather cheaper, was also important.

The invention of the silvered-glass mirror is credited to German chemist Justus von Liebig in 1835.[26] His wet deposition process involved the deposition of a thin layer of metallic silver onto glass through the chemical reduction of silver nitrate. This silvering process was adapted for mass manufacturing and led to the greater availability of affordable mirrors.

Back to first link:

Quote
Birds that migrate at night, like sparrows and warblers, rely on the stars to navigate. Bright lights from buildings both attract and confuse them, leading to window strikes or birds flying around the lights until they die from exhaustion — a phenomenon known as fatal light attraction. In 2017, for example, almost 400 passerines became disoriented in a Galveston, Texas, skyscraper's floodlights and died in collisions with windows.

Which civilization introduced floodlights to the world?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light-emitting_diode#History

Quote
Electroluminescence as a phenomenon was discovered in 1907 by the English experimenter H. J. Round of Marconi Labs, using a crystal of silicon carbide and a cat's-whisker detector.[9][10] Russian inventor Oleg Losev reported the creation of the first LED in 1927.[11] His research was distributed in Soviet, German and British scientific journals, but no practical use was made of the discovery for several decades, partly due to the very inefficient light-producing properties of silicon carbide, the semiconductor Losev used.[12][13]

In 1936, Georges Destriau observed that electroluminescence could be produced when zinc sulphide (ZnS) powder is suspended in an insulator and an alternating electrical field is applied to it. In his publications, Destriau often referred to luminescence as Losev-Light. Destriau worked in the laboratories of Madame Marie Curie, also an early pioneer in the field of luminescence with research on radium.[14][15]

Hungarian Zoltán Bay together with György Szigeti pre-empted LED lighting in Hungary in 1939 by patenting a lighting device based on silicon carbide, with an option on boron carbide, that emitted white, yellowish white, or greenish white depending on impurities present.[16]
...
The first visible-spectrum (red) LED was demonstrated by J. W. Allen and R. J. Cherry in late 1961 at the SERL in Baldock, UK. This work was reported in the Journal of Physics and Chemistry of Solids, Volume 23, Issue 5, May 1962, pages 509–511. Another early device was demonstrated by Nick Holonyak on October 9, 1962, while he was working for General Electric in Syracuse, New York.[24] Holonyak and Bevacqua reported this LED in the journal Applied Physics Letters on December 1, 1962.[25][26] M. George Craford,[27] a former graduate student of Holonyak, invented the first yellow LED and improved the brightness of red and red-orange LEDs by a factor of ten in 1972.[28] In 1976, T. P. Pearsall designed the first high-brightness, high-efficiency LEDs for optical fiber telecommunications by inventing new semiconductor materials specifically adapted to optical fiber transmission wavelengths.[29]

Back to first link:

Quote
“When it was built, people weren't thinking about bird safety. They still aren't in most architecture. It's right on the lakefront. There are many nights when it's lit up. People are describing the whole night of migration as part of a once in a lifetime thing ... (but) this still is an unacceptable intrusion by humans and their architecture. Just terribly sad and dramatic.”

Not all humans, just Westerners.
Posted by: X
« on: October 04, 2023, 09:58:21 pm »

Do I need to worry about Disease X? Here's what experts say about the threat posed by unknown future pandemics.
Quote
The ominously-named “Disease X” isn’t an actual disease (yet). But it’s gaining attention online as experts look beyond COVID-19 to future public health threats.
What's happening

Disease X is a term that was created years ago, and the World Health Organization started including it on its list of priority diseases in 2017 alongside familiar diseases like Zika and Ebola. It’s used as a placeholder for new, yet-to-be-discovered threats, with WHO writing that “Disease X represents the knowledge that a serious international epidemic could be caused by a pathogen currently unknown to cause human disease.”

COVID-19, caused by the then-new SARS-CoV-2 virus, was an example of a Disease X when it first emerged at the end of 2019.
Do I need to worry?

“It is definitely something to worry about, and it is not a matter of if we're going to have another pandemic — it's a matter of when,” Pablo Penaloza-MacMaster, an assistant professor of microbiology-immunology at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, tells Yahoo Life of the threat posed by undiscovered pathogens and future pandemics.

There was more than a 100-year gap between the COVID-19 pandemic and the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic, but experts say it likely won’t be that long between pandemics in the future, for a number of reasons:

Population growth: A larger, denser global population gives pathogens more susceptible hosts and more opportunities to jump from person to person.

Which civilization is most responsible for human overpopulation?:

Quote
In 1800, when the Industrial Revolution began, there were approximately 1 billion people on Earth. Continued agricultural expansion and extraction of fossil fuels and minerals led to rapid global economic growth and, in turn, population growth in the 19th century.

Continuing with the article:

Quote
More travel: People are traveling farther and with more ease than ever before — which facilitates the spread of diseases.

Which civilization invented planes, trains, and automobiles? Continuing:

Quote
Global warming: Climate change is worsening the spread and severity of infectious diseases and could also lead to the reemergence of ancient viruses as permafrost melts.

Which civilization is most responsible for climate-change? Further:

Quote
Deforestation and encroachment on wildlife: By destroying and invading animals’ natural habitats, we’re blurring the boundaries between humans and animals — giving viruses and other pathogens that previously only infected animals more opportunities to jump to human hosts.

Which civilization is most responsible for deforestation on a scale hitherto unknown in all of human history?

Hint:


Back to the article:

Quote
“We've learned the hard way from COVID-19 the ramifications of not being prepared,” Dr. Wafaa El-Sadr, an epidemiology professor at Columbia's Mailman School of Public Health and lead of the New York City Pandemic Response Institute, tells Yahoo Life. “So I think it behooves us to anticipate and prepare for a potential next pandemic that may come down the line.”...
Entire article: https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/do-i-need-to-worry-about-disease-x-200620896.html

Next pandemic: Disease X is 20 times deadlier than covid-19 l WION ORIGINALS
Quote
Disease X is 20 times deadlier than covid-19
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVL8jR1mB68

Disease X News | Disease X: Can This Potential Threat Be Deadlier Than Covid? | English News | N18V
Quote
The next pandemic could take 50 million lives said Dame Kate Bingham, who chaired the UK's Vaccine Taskforce saying that it might already be on its way and that Covid-19 was not that lethal. The new pandemic has been dubbed Disease X by World Health Organisation (WHO) and Bingham says it could be 20 times deadlier than Coronavirus. Bingham told Daily Mail, “The world will have to prepare for mass vaccination drives and deliver the doses in record time…Imagine Disease X is as infectious as measles with the fatality rate of Ebola (67 per cent). Somewhere in the world, it's replicating, and sooner or later, somebody will start feeling sick.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6nRo7blSuU
Posted by: 90sRetroFan
« on: October 01, 2023, 10:54:14 pm »

Western civilization is everywhere:

https://www.yahoo.com/news/scientists-uncover-concerning-surprise-lurking-113000909.html

Quote
Scientists uncover concerning surprise lurking in Arctic air: ‘We find them even in remote polar regions’
...
air samples in areas stretching from the Norwegian coastline to the Arctic.

After analyzing the samples, the researchers identified the types of plastic particles in the atmosphere, including polyester, polyethylene terephthalate — likely from the fashion industry — polypropylene polycarbonate, and polystyrene.

Debris from tires was also a significant source of microplastics.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/japanese-scientists-microplastics-present-clouds-204914762.html

Quote
Researchers in Japan have confirmed microplastics are present in clouds, where they are likely affecting the climate in ways that aren't yet fully understood.

In a study published in Environmental Chemistry Letters, scientists climbed Mount Fuji and Mount Oyama in order to collect water from the mists that shroud their peaks, then applied advanced imaging techniques to the samples to determine their physical and chemical properties.

The team identified nine different types of polymers and one type of rubber in the airborne microplastics -- ranging in size from 7.1 to 94.6 micrometers.

Each liter of cloud water contained between 6.7 to 13.9 pieces of the plastics.

What's more, "hydrophilic" or water-loving polymers were abundant, suggesting the particles play a significant role in rapid cloud formation and thus climate systems.

"If the issue of 'plastic air pollution' is not addressed proactively, climate change and ecological risks may become a reality, causing irreversible and serious environmental damage in the future," lead author Hiroshi Okochi of Waseda University warned in a statement Wednesday.

When microplastics reach the upper atmosphere and are exposed to ultraviolet radiation from sunlight, they degrade, contributing to greenhouse gasses, added Okochi.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/scientists-microplastics-cave-sealed-off-093053696.html

Quote
A cave that's been closed off to human visitors for 30 years has been found to contain high concentrations of microplastics — and that should worry you.
...
This suggests that water is depositing the microplastics into the sediment, where it gets stored long term — decades or more — even after the water recedes, the researchers concluded, adding that airborne particles could also be settling into the cave bed.
...
Ominously, Hasenmueller says that these plastic particles contaminating caves could seep into groundwater, which humans use to drink. Beyond that, it also threatens to disrupt the habitats of bats and amphibians that inhabit the caves.

Given how ubiquitous plastics are, it'll be a difficult trend to reverse. One solution according to Hasenmueller is that society as a whole should ditch synthetic clothing.

"A lot of the debris that we found in this cave was synthetic fibers from textiles," she said.
Posted by: 90sRetroFan
« on: September 28, 2023, 05:21:07 pm »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKlPLlNaqw4

Which civilization introduced asbestos into the world?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asbestos#History

Quote
The large-scale asbestos industry began in the mid-19th century. Early attempts at producing asbestos paper and cloth in Italy began in the 1850s but were unsuccessful in creating a market for such products. Canadian samples of asbestos were displayed in London in 1862, and the first companies were formed in England and Scotland to exploit this resource. Asbestos was first used in the manufacture of yarn, and German industrialist Louis Wertheim adopted this process in his factories in Germany. [36] In 1871, the Patent Asbestos Manufacturing Company was established in Glasgow, and during the following decades, the Clydebank area became a centre for the nascent industry.[37]

Industrial-scale mining began in the Thetford hills, Quebec, from the 1870s. Sir William Edmond Logan was the first to notice the large deposits of chrysotile in the hills in his capacity as head of Geological Survey of Canada. Samples of the minerals from there were displayed in London and elicited much interest.[36] With the opening of the Quebec Central Railway in 1876, mining entrepreneurs such as Andrew Stuart Johnson established the asbestos industry in the province.[38] The 50-ton output of the mines in 1878 rose to over 10,000 tonnes in the 1890s with the adoption of machine technologies and expanded production.[36][39] For a long time, the world's largest asbestos mine was the Jeffrey mine in the town of Asbestos, Quebec.[40]

Asbestos production began in the Urals of the Russian Empire in the 1880s, and the Alpine regions of Northern Italy with the formation in Turin of the Italo-English Pure Asbestos Company in 1876, although this was soon swamped by the greater production levels from the Canadian mines. Mining also took off in South Africa from 1893 under the aegis of the British businessman Francis Oates, the director of the De Beers company.[41] It was in South Africa that the production of amosite began in 1910. The U.S. asbestos industry had an early start in 1858 when fibrous anthophyllite was mined for use as asbestos insulation by the Johns Company, a predecessor to the current Johns Manville, at a quarry at Ward's Hill on Staten Island, New York.[42] US production began in earnest in 1899 with the discovery of large deposits in Belvidere Mountain.

The use of asbestos became increasingly widespread toward the end of the 19th century when its diverse applications included fire-retardant coatings, concrete, bricks, pipes and fireplace cement, heat-, fire-, and acid-resistant gaskets, pipe insulation, ceiling insulation, fireproof drywall, flooring, roofing, lawn furniture, and drywall joint compound. In 2011, it was reported that over 50% of UK houses still contained asbestos, despite a ban on asbestos products some years earlier.[43]
Posted by: rp
« on: September 27, 2023, 05:32:38 pm »

Posted by: 90sRetroFan
« on: September 24, 2023, 05:31:04 pm »

https://www.yahoo.com/news/california-workers-cut-countertops-dying-100021788.html

Quote
California workers who cut countertops are dying of an incurable disease
...
Silicosis can ravage the lungs of workers after they inhale tiny particles of crystalline silica while they cut and grind stone that contains the mineral.

The disease dates back centuries, but researchers say the booming popularity of countertops made of engineered stone, which has much higher concentrations of silica than many kinds of natural stone, has driven a new epidemic of an accelerated form of the suffocating illness. As the dangerous dust builds up and scars the lungs, the disease can leave workers short of breath, weakened and ultimately suffering from lung failure.
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In California, it has begun to debilitate young workers, largely Latino immigrants who cut and polish slabs of engineered stone. Instead of cropping up in people in their 60s or 70s after decades of exposure, it is now afflicting men in their 20s, 30s or 40s, said Dr. Jane Fazio, a pulmonary critical care physician who became alarmed by cases she saw at Olive View-UCLA Medical Center. Some California patients have died in their 30s.

"They're young guys who essentially have a terminal diagnosis," Fazio said.
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Engineered stone is now estimated to represent more than 60% of materials used for countertops, the L.A. County business federation said, and market researchers say its popularity is only expected to rise.

So, can you guess which civilization introduced engineered stone into the world? The same one as usual, of course:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_stone

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One of the earliest examples of artificial stone was Coade stone (originally called Lithodipyra), a ceramic created by Eleanor Coade (1733–1821), and produced from 1769 to 1833. Later, in 1844, Frederick Ransome created a Patent Siliceous Stone, which comprised sand and powdered flint in an alkaline solution.[1] By heating it in an enclosed high-temperature steam boiler the siliceous particles were bound together and could be moulded or worked into filtering slabs, vases, tombstones, decorative architectural work, emery wheels and grindstones.

This was followed by Victoria stone, which comprises three parts finely-crushed Mountsorrel (Leicestershire) granite to one of Portland cement, mechanically mixed and cast in moulds. When set the moulds are loosened and the blocks placed in a solution of silicate of soda for about two weeks to indurate and harden them.[2]
Posted by: Z
« on: September 19, 2023, 06:58:45 pm »

'Ghost gear' piles up in the Gulf of Maine amid plastic onslaught on oceans
Quote
Abandoned fishing gear, often called "ghost gear," is breaking down in our oceans and adding to the problems brought by plastics and microplastics. But there was a recent effort to get the United Nations to enforce tougher regulations, and a coalition announced new funding to remove some debris in the Gulf of Maine. Science correspondent Miles O'Brien reports.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGx2kV0IEA8