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Sustainability in Action: Christmas Trees Provide Habitat for Coho Salmon
By Roberta Attanasio There are many remarkable features of salmon, and one of these is their ability to travel thousands of miles in the ocean, struggle with river currents and waterfalls, and finally reach their hatching place. Indeed, salmon live in the ocean, but are born and spawn in freshwater rivers and streams. The young salmon spend at least some of their early…
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The Science of Chocolate: How Long Does it Survive in Hospital Wards?
By Roberta Attanasio The prestigious British Medical Journal is giving the best Christmas present ever to its readers: food for thought. The food is chocolate, the thought (or concern) is chocolate survival. A new research article published just a few days ago and entitled “The survival time of chocolates on hospital wards: covert observational study” presents the result of a study…
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Flame Retardants in Honey?
By Roberta Attanasio When the bees feast on flowers, we enjoy honey, the increasingly popular nature’s sweetener and bearer of many health benefits. The “foodie” boom has generated not only appreciation for the aroma, texture and flavor profiles of different types of honey, but also demand for cosmetics and fragrances that contain it. Not everything about honey is as good as it…
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Electronic Waste: A Global, Interactive Map
By The Editors In one of our previous posts (Electronic Waste and the Global Toxic Trade) we said “As technology changes come by very rapidly in great acceleration-style, the amount of obsolete and discarded high tech material also grows, great acceleration-style, around the world.” Now, data compiled by “Solving the E-Waste Problem (StEP) Initiative“, a partnership of UN organizations, industry,…
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750 Miles of Smog
By The Editors Thick haze stretching over a distance of about 750 miles (1,200 kilometers) has been captured a few days ago (December 7, 2013) by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite. In the image below, the brightest areas are clouds or fog. Polluted air appears gray. The haze stretched from Beijing (top) to Shanghai (bottom), China. You can read more about this…
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Embarrassing Facebook Posts May Cause Anguish
By The Editors A new study from Northwestern University explores the strength of the emotional response to “violations” or ”threats” on Facebook – something that gets posted and results in embarrassment and may, sometimes, create anguish. Jeremy Birnholtz, one of the researchers, said: “Almost every participant in the study could describe something that happened on Facebook in the past six…
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Eco-Label Effect: The Good Taste of Coffee
By Roberta Attanasio Do you want your coffee to taste better? Call it “eco-friendly”. Results from a newly published study show that eco-labels, as for example “fair-trade” or “organic”, promote a willingness to pay more for the product, and not only. These labels also lead people to perceive that products with an eco-label taste better than identical, but unlabeled products.…
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Forests: A Map of Global Changes
By The Editors This map — based on data from the NASA-U.S. Geological Survey Landsat 7 satellite — shows the worldwide forest cover, as well as the loss and gain of forest cover occurring over a period of 12 years (2000 – 2012). During this period, 888,000 square miles (2.3 million square kilometers) of forest were lost, and 309,000 square miles…
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The Golden Grain of the Andes: Are You Ready to Cook?
By The Editors The Golden Grain of the Andes — quinoa — is being praised all around the world. Indeed, the year 2013 is “The International Year of the Quinoa”, which celebrates not only quinoa, but also the indigenous peoples of the Andes, who have maintained, controlled, protected and preserved quinoa as food for present and future generations, thanks to…
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Lifestyle Factors: Focus on Healthy Pregnancy
By Roberta Attanasio Too many times the medical field views pregnancy in terms of risks leading to potential problems for the mother, the baby, or both. Does it have to be so? Researchers from the UK, Ireland and New Zealand thought this may not be the case and shifted the focus of their research on pregnancy, from abnormality to normality.…
