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Categories: Geoscience: Environmental Issues, Space: Exploration

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For years, unrecycled plastic bottles have been dumped in landfills. Now, thanks to new research, those bottles may have a second life in that landfill -- stabilizing its earth walls.

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Plastic waste is a problem on our beaches. Hence, it is largely removed in a coordinated manner within a few weeks. However, it can litter other coasts of the world for many months to years due to unregulated waste disposal. Often the garbage on the beach is simply burned and a special form of plastic waste is created: so-called plastiglomerate. This 'rock' is made up of natural components, such as coral fragments, held together by the melted and reconsolidated plastic. A new study has now demonstrated, using field samples from Indonesia, that such rocks pose an increased environmental risk to coastal ecosystems such as seagrass beds, mangroves or coral reefs. The melted plastic decomposes more quickly into microplastics and is also contaminated with organic pollutants.

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Flexible spheres of the biomolecule chitosan, made from shrimp waste, can be used for catalysts that generate hydrogen gas from borohydride salts. A research team now shows how the spheres can 'breathe out' hydrogen bubbles without breaking. This is an important step towards practical and safe hydrogen storage and release units.

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A team has modeled the early impact history of Venus to explain how Earth's sister planet has maintained a youthful surface despite lacking plate tectonics. The team compared the early collision histories of the two bodies and determined that Venus likely experienced higher-speed, higher-energy impacts creating a super-heated core that promoted extended volcanism and resurfaced the planet.

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Researchers look at water in galaxies, its distribution and in particular its changes of state from ice to vapor, as important markers indicating areas of increased energy, in which black holes and stars are formed. A new study has now revealed the distribution of water within the J1135 galaxy, which is 12 billion light years away and formed when the Universe was a 'teenager', 1.8 billion years after the Big Bang . This water map, with unprecedented resolution, is the first ever to be obtained for such a remote galaxy. The map can help scientists to understand the physical processes taking place within J1135 and shed light on the dynamics, still partially unclear, surrounding the formation of stars, black holes and galaxies themselves.

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A team researchers has discovered molecular crystals capable of capturing iodine -- one of the most common radioactive fission products -- and other pollutants. The versatile crystals could be used for nuclear waste management and other energy-related applications and move the world closer to a net-zero future.

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In a first for white dwarfs, the burnt-out cores of dead stars, astronomers have discovered that at least one member of this cosmic family is two faced. One side of the white dwarf is composed of hydrogen, while the other is made up of helium.

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Researchers have created a bioengineered yeast that can grow efficiently on a wide range of sugars from agricultural waste biomass, closing a carbon cycle for the biosynthesis of fuels, pharmaceuticals and plastics.

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Astronomers used the state-of-the-art capability of VERA, a Japanese network of radio telescopes, to uncover valuable clues about how rapidly growing 'young' supermassive black holes form, grow, and possibly evolve into more powerful quasars.

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Early experiments have revealed significant benefits to a dry battery manufacturing process. This eliminates the use of toxic solvents while showing promise for delivering a battery that is durable, less weighed down by inactive elements and able to maintain high energy storage capacity after use. Such improvements could boost wider EV adoption, helping to reduce carbon emissions and achieve U.S. climate goals.

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Fertilizer restrictions along Florida's 156-mile-long Indian River Lagoon were intended to reduce nutrient inputs from urban and agricultural land uses. The hope was that water quality would improve by reducing the nitrogen load. While these restrictions were well-intended, a study finds fertilizer use is not the root cause of the lagoon's environmental issues. It's sewage. For decades, fertilizer use was implicated for about 71 percent of the lagoon's environmental impairments. In fact, current estimates show 79 percent of nitrogen loading is from septic systems; 21 percent is from residential fertilizer use.

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A new study compiles the scope of the problem of the global dispersal of harmful microorganisms through the upper layers of the atmosphere.

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The space laser GEDI has allowed researchers to 3D map Earth's rainforests for the first time ever, helping us understand the forest canopy and providing vital information for understanding Earth's carbon cycle and how it is changing.

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Scientists once assumed that flooding and mudslides after wildfires were linked to the waxy coating that builds up on charred soil, preventing water absorption. Researchers found that water flow came from absorbed water in both burnt and unburnt areas, suggesting that water was, in fact, being absorbed into burnt ground. The discovery provides valuable insights into where and when potential flooding and mudslides may occur and how landscapes recover after a wildfire.

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A team has found that NASA's Juno spacecraft orbiting Jupiter frequently encounters giant swirling waves at the boundary between the solar wind and Jupiter's magnetosphere. The waves are an important process for transferring energy and mass from the solar wind, a stream of charged particles emitted by the Sun, to planetary space environments.

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In the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, alien radio signals would be swamped by interference from radio sources on Earth. To confirm, researchers point away from the source and then back. If it's still there, it may be interesting. Researchers have come up with a new method that looks for evidence the signal has passed through the interstellar medium. The technique will boost confidence in any candidate signal discovered in the future.

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The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured a monster in the making in this observation of the exceptional galaxy cluster eMACS J1353.7+4329, which lies about eight billion light-years from Earth in the constellation Canes Venatici. This collection of at least two galaxy clusters is in the process of merging together to create a cosmic monster, a single gargantuan cluster acting as a gravitational lens.

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New observations have distinguished the sites of star formation and a possible site of star death from the surrounding nebula in a galaxy 13.2 billion light-years away. This is the farthest that such structures have been observed.

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Tucked into the hillsides of Italy, Portugal, and Spain, some of the world's most famous -- and most difficult to maintain -- vineyards are heralded for their unique flavor profiles and centuries of tradition. But as extreme weather and changing socioeconomic conditions make this so-called 'heroic viticulture' even more challenging, scientists worry these grapes and their cultural histories are at risk. Researchers argue that farmers and scientists must work together to protect some of the world's most celebrated wines.

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Brown dwarf stars rarely emit radio waves. Here scientists have found the coldest star yet emitting at these long wave lengths. Understanding the science of 'ultracool brown dwarfs' will help deepen our knowledge of how stars evolve.