Green Options

Does your child’s school have plants in the classrooms? If not, they should. Plants could make going to school more enjoyable. A recent study published in the journal HortScience found that the presence of greenery in classrooms had a significant positive impact on the level of satisfaction students felt in relation to learning, instructors’ enthusiasm and instructors’ organization.

Since many Americans spend up to 80% of the day indoors, it’s no surprise that bringing nature inside is a good thing. Previous studies have shown houseplants can help clean indoor air, reduce tension, improve coping mechanisms, boost work productivity and help increase concentration and attention.

It has been assumed for most of the history of micro-biological science that such micro-organisms are purely “reflexive”; they simply respond and adapt to external stimuli (such as exposure to chemicals, heat stress, or drugs). But research over he past 2 years by two different scientific teams (a Princeton team lead by Saeed Tavazoie, and, a team from the Weizmann Institute in Israel) is shaking up present understanding and over-turning basic assumptions.

Long-tailed macaques eat mostly fruit — but when resources are scarce, they’ve been known to get creative with their cuisine. When living near humans, they raid gardens and learn to beg for food. Sometimes they even steal food from inside houses.

Now, for the first time, scientists have observed long-tailed macaques fishing with their bare hands.