Browse Articles

Expanded polystyrene (EPS) is a plastic used to make food containers and packing materials that poses a threat to the environment. Mealworms can degrade EPS, but at a slow rate. Here, researchers assessed the impact of food waste compost and oats on the speed of EPS consumption by mealworms, superworms, and waxworms. A positive correlation was found between food waste compost supplementation and EPS consumption, especially by mealworms, indicating a potential industrial application.

In this study, the authors address the current climate concern of high CO₂ levels by testing solid forms of hydroxide for CO₂ reduction and designing a drone to fly it in ambient air!

This study tested the impact over several days of air-water gas exchange on pH recovery in acidified Long Island Sound water treated with chemical, mineral, and biological buffers.

This study examined how prescribed fires affect arthropods in riparian zones surrounding wetlands in north-central Florida. Researchers found that spider abundance remained largely unchanged, while springtail abundance initially decreased but rebounded substantially one month after burning, suggesting early recovery of the riparian food web.

This study compared two commercial shower filters and three individual filtration media to evaluate their ability to reduce total residual chlorine under household flow conditions. By identifying which materials most effectively reduce chlorine during regular shower use, this research provides practical information for consumers and offers guidance for designing more affordable and reusable shower filtration systems.

Here the authors investigated the effectiveness of algal pretreatment in reducing nitrate toxicity and extending the survival of fish in contaminated river water. Their findings demonstrate that treating nitrate-polluted water with algae extended fish survival by up to 50%, suggesting that algae could serve as a valuable tool for mitigating the destructive impacts of agricultural and industrial runoff on aquatic ecosystems.

Multi-perspective drone imagery (adding oblique views to top-down shots) raised crop classification accuracy from 35.73% to 52.93% across five species. The improvement scaled with canopy complexity, from +4.2% for simple rice to +38.1% for structurally complex sugarcane.

The authors monitored water quality over time looking for influences from construction and deforestation.

We developed new eco-friendly membranes enriched with natural nanomaterials to clean iron and manganese from drinking water. Some nanocomposite membranes achieved over 95% metal removal while maintaining water flux, suggesting improved performance compared to the undoped control group.

When granular materials are poured onto a surface, they form conical piles whose slopes increase before reaching a stable angle of repose. We found that this angle evolution follows a previously unrecognized two-phase exponential growth pattern that is conserved across granular materials with diverse particle properties. The parameters of this model correlate with particle friction and are influenced by deposition conditions, providing a quantitative framework for describing pile formation.