In many ways plastics are simply synthetic compounds that mimic and try to improve upon substances we find widespread in nature—polymers such as you might find in wood, leaves, seeds and fur. Bio-based plastics (those derived from biological sources other than fossil fuels) have been around for more than 100 years. In fact, celluloid, the first synthetic plastic ever made was invented in the mid 1800s, and—you guessed it—was bio-based.

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US Secretary of Energy, Dr. Steven Chu

Arizona State University professor Cody Friesen thinks he can make a metal-air battery with up to 11 times the energy density of lithium batteries at potentially half the cost. Now the US Department of Energy’s advanced research incubator ARPA-E has just given his spin-off company, Fluidic Energy, a $5.13 million research grant to try and do just that.

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In 1877 Russian scientist Dimitri Mendeelev suggested that the large deposits of oil and gas we find under the surface of the Earth could be made without the decay of long-dead organisms in a process called abiotic synthesis of methane.

Since then the theory has been relegated to the back shelf due to a lack of evidence and the prevailing conventional wisdom that all deep oil and gas deposits arise from decaying prehistoric animal and plant material.

While it’s no doubt that the decay of dead animals and plants is one pathway to the creation of Earth’s oil and natural gas deposits (potentially the largest), new research done with high-tech equipment simulating the conditions of deep earth suggests that Mendeelev’s theory is correct.

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Combining the brilliance of nature with some top-notch engineering, these two scientists are on to something and getting the funding for it.

The researchers are breaking ground with this and looking to raise water monitoring to another level.

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The discussions following my two last posts about climate change opinion shifts and about an anti-science coalition have made it clear that one of the reasons people distrust science is that “Science” fails to speak with one voice.  There are definitely forces from the outside of Science that erode trust, but there are also internal issues.

The problem is that Science will not ever “speak with one voice.”  Scientists often have different opinions about a given topic.  Often that simply represents a healthy part of the scientific process.  When I hear someone say, “scientists don’t even agree about this!” I want to say, “you don’t know many scientists, do you!”  We are trained to questions assumptions and scrutinize analytical methods.  We are taught how to spot artifacts and how to come up with alternate hypotheses.  Some scientists get a little aggressive about this (there is usually at least one curmudgeon in every department).

There are definitely some topics that are so complex that it is impossible to be 100% sure about conclusions.  There are questions that are not amenable to running a controlled experiment.  These are all factors that make a topic like climate change so controversial.  These are legitimate reasons for the lack of a single “answer from science.”

All the above said, there are plenty of examples of scientific disagreements that arise from what can only, honestly be called bad science. Doing science well is non-trivial.  It requires a good deal of mental rigor and comprehensive information acquisition.  If we scientists are honest we all have to admit that we can fall short of the ideal “scientific method” at times.  Trust in “Science” ultimately means trusting “Scientists” and thats sometimes where the trouble starts.  There are 5 main ways that I can think of that scientsts can “behave badly.”  Maybe you can add some more.

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A wise Nebraska farmer I know taught me this saying: “It’s what you know for certain that keeps you from learning.”   This principle is at the core of why certain groups and entities are rejecting good science.

As a scientist, and particularly as a scientist involved in agricultural and environmental issues, I’m increasingly aware of this trend.  In some cases this involves open hostility to science, in others it is just a matter of ignoring the scientific input. What is disturbing is how many different “voices” are in this unlikely “coalition” and the extent to which they are coloring the views of the broader society  (as seen in the recent Pew survey of American attitudes about climate change). 

At acknowledged risk of offending people, I will try to describe factions in the groups that tend to reject things that science would tell them.  I know that what I am talking about does not apply to everyone, or even most people in these groups, but it is still a potent force in our society. 

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Without pavement and parking lots we would still be traveling cross-country in Conestoga wagons on 6-inch deep ruts and be breathing lungfulls of dust every time a vehicle drove by at the Kwik-E-Mart. Needless to say, pavement is one of the many things that makes modern life possible.

But, like everything else in our modern life, the more advanced we get in our ability to collect and analyze data, the more we realize that the good stuff always seems to have its awful consequences too. It’s the same story with pavement.

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Last Monday the popular show “CSI: Miami” ran a segment in which a young woman dies and it turns out to be because of a GMO corn developed by a rogue company called “Bixton Organic Foods.”  In the plot, the company willingly puts people at risk.  This fictional scenario bears no plausible tie to reality, but it fits well with the simplistic, good guys/bad guys image in the Myth that many people believe about farming.  To see how it feels to be the brunt of a distortion like this, I recommend you read a post from a real corn farmer.  

So why is it possible for CBS writers to generate fictional “drama” about the “danger of GMO” when in fact GMO technology has been used with complete safety for more than a decade on a gigantic scale?  (Having witnessed first-hand the thought and care that went into developing this technology over the past 30 years, I’m not surprised by that safety record).  There is an abundance of good information available about this technology including many confirmations of its safety by panel after panel of highly qualified, science and medical experts around the world.  I think the reason that the fear of GMO persists in certain extreme circles is the same reason that there are still “birthers” and people who are sure that health reform will lead to “death panels.”  Its not that there is much overlap between these demographics but rather that the same mechanism of “selective knowing” is involved.

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Surely after so many embarrassing meals I would have learned not to order the spiciest thing on the menu by now, but there’s something about a chili pepper that I can’t resist.

That something, it turns out, is capsaicin, a chemical compound produced by chilies to ward off unwanted consumers. The higher the concentration of capsaicin in a chili, the hotter it is.

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They don’t know how it works, but it does.

A team of researchers at Georgia Tech has developed a new high-tech ceramic material that could make solid oxide fuel cells less costly and less finicky, and much more durable and efficient. The material is called Barium-Zirconium-Cerium-Yttrium-Ytterbuim Oxide. [Ed note: Say that three times fast and you get a gold star.] I don’t know if it’s any less of a tongue twister, but it’s known as BZCYYb for short.

Solid oxide fuel cells are of interest because they can generate energy without the need for an expensive catalyst such as platinum, which is typically used in hydrogen fuel cells. While nanotechnology is enabling the development of hydrogen fuel cells that use less platinum, with BZCYYb the prospects look good for ditching the precious metal entirely in favor of more sustainable technology—if solid oxide systems can be developed in a commercially viable form, that is.

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Can you imagine anything worse than being somewhere in public and realizing your breath is loaded with a smell so pungent that it’s offending everyone in a one mile radius from you?

It may be fair to say that garlic tops the list there.

Yikes. I’ve nightmares about this and think having a constant supply of a combination of mouthwash and chewing gum in my bag would be a great idea, but the fact remains that licking some grrr-lick can work nothing short of wonders for you, despite its grrrr factor.

Plus with a reputation for preventing everything from the common cold to aging, garlic is as much known for its versatility as for its effectiveness.

Hey, it can even be effective as a repellent - and not just for mosquitoes.

The word garlic comes from  garleac, meaning “spear leek” in Old English. It is reported to be native to Central Asia, and dates back over 6000 years.

But it was the Egyptians historically that took garlic to the next level. They worshipped it and placed clay garlic bulb models  in the tomb of none else than Tutankhamen. Can you believe, they even used it as currency? Who would’ve thought that money could stink so bad?

Egyptian folklore holds that garlic repelled vampires and ghosts, protected against the “Evil Eye”, and warded off nymphs said to terrorize pregnant women and engaged maidens. Garlic was also considered an aphrodisiac in Egypt. Nature decided to enshrine this super-substance in stink.

Researchers have known that the distinct aroma, flavor and healing properties of garlic come from an organic compound in garlic called allicin, which is also a powerful antioxidant or something that stop the damaging effects of radicals that can accelerate certain diseases.

Like a lot of other herbal medicines though, garlic was not subjected to a vigorous scientific study until earlier this year.

In a Science News report,Queen’s University Chemistry professor Derek Pratt, who led a study on how garlic does it said “We didn’t understand how garlic could contain such an efficient antioxidant, since it didn’t have a substantial amount of the types of compounds usually responsible for high antioxidant activity in plants, such as the flavanoids found in green tea or grapes.”

The  team experimented with synthetically-produced allicin, they found that an acid produced when allicin decomposes rapidly reacts with radicals, more than the allicin itself, explaining its effects better.

According to Dr. Pratt, who is Canada Research Chair in Free Radical Chemistry, no one has ever seen compounds, natural or synthetic, react this quickly as antioxidants.

“The reaction between the sulfenic acid and radicals is as fast as it can get, limited only by the time it takes for the two molecules to come into contact,” he told Science News.

That’s all for the science part. From the personal angle, I wonder why Nature wraps extremely good things in extremely bad packages. Maybe the rock band, The Verve, got it right when they sang that life is a bittersweet symphony. And sometimes it’s easier to appreciate the sweet, when you’ve had a taste of the bitter.

(Images courtesy of www.braquiplan.com & www.britannica.com)

Revered in India as “holy” this golden-yellow colored powder is worth its weight in gold, that too nutritionally, but not monetarily.

Any guesses what I’m talking about?

This ingredient has been hailed for centuries for its ability to treat wounds, infections and other health problems. But until recently, the science of the healing remained a mystery.

We’re talking, of course, about turmeric. None else can fill its yellow shoes.        The Turmeric Plant

The use of turmeric as a coloring and healing agent for food  dates back to as far as 600 B.C. Amongst the other oldest recorded references to turmeric is an account by Marco Polo in his travels to China in 1280. Repeated historical references to turmeric across communities ensured it crossed over from folklore into everyday use.

Curios researchers that flocked to test the powder in the last few decades, identified curcumin as the chief active ingredient in turmeric. This said little though, apart from changing the alphabets that carried the mystery from turmeric to curcumin. But it added specificity to the “magical” effect of turmeric, by labeling curcumin an antioxidant, anti-cancer, antibiotic, antiviral and other properties has been revealed.

It wasn’t until March this year that University of Michigan researchers led by Ayyalusamy Ramamoorthy discovered the scientific basis of curcumin’s activities in human cells.

It turns out that cucurcmin is somewhat of a Nazi. The molecule inserting itself into the cell membranes, somehow making them more orderly. And somehow being lined up straight makes cells more resistant to infection and malignancy.

If you ask me, while the curcurmin is doing everything it’s supposed to in cells, the scientists need to do some more explaining.

Ramamoorthy, the lead Professor of chemistry and biophysics behind this work told Science News that the cell membrane goes from being crazy and floppy to being more disciplined and ordered, so that information flow through it can be controlled.

Wow.

With no science education to her credit, my grandmother just knew that  giving me turmeric in milk when I had a cold as a child growing up in India, would work wonders for me. It did.

Natural antibiotics like turmeric exemplify what I think should be a larger trend. It is this larger trend that Michel Pollan is advocating throughout the country in his talks. His book, aptly titled “In Defense of Food” argues, that nature has everything we ever needed for healthy living and that it is time society took a step towards a more natural form of living. His argument that there are cultures all over the world today that are closer o nature and healthier than the more affluent, but more artificial societies of the west also points us in the same direction.

In fact, if anything, it is unnaturalness that is the primary cause of  unhealthy lifestyles today. The sheer change in levels of human activity in the last few decades are probably nothing less than an evolutionary shock to the human body, which was programmed for far higher levels of activity. From forging for our own food, to moving less than a few feet to reach into the fridge, is a spectacular change and one that definitely comes with implications.

It may be useful for us to realize that biggest experiments with food were for earlier times, and those times solved the major questions. Ours may be to stick to that and interestingly, this makes me think that progress can sometimes mean regressing, but intelligently.

According to Science News, Ramamoorthy too was given turmeric laced milk to drink when he had a cold as a child, (not by my grandmother though.)

Lithium-ion batteries are great and all—having heralded in a new age of portable electronics and allowed for the possibility of mass-market electric cars—but they have a few major drawbacks. For instance, they have a propensity to catch fire and explode and, although they have a much better energy storage capacity than say lead-acid or nickel metal hydride (NiMH) batteries, they still weigh too much to pack more than a couple hundred miles of range into a passenger car.

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The economy definitely had an impact on this year’s West Coast Green with less venders but with less money that mean that people just had to get more creative with less moola such as the floating island, show gardens and even the sustainability built Jewish Sukkoth. The usual green rock stars like Eric Corey Freed and Michelle Kaufman made their presences felt with their energetic personalities.

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As part of a National Science Foundation grant program to examine cutting edge ways to make nature work for us, a team of scientists at Iowa State University have been awarded $2 million to unravel how some plants and algae can make hydrocarbons and discover if the genes that govern that process might be isolated.

“These plants are capturing solar energy and creating something that’s chemically identical to petroleum,” said Jackie Shanks, Iowa State’s Manley R. Hoppe Professor of Chemical Engineering, in a statement.

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This post is going to be another struggle for balance.  The threat from this particular mycotoxin in the food supply is a so large that it makes the risks that worry most people look tame.  It makes the subject of one of my previous posts about another mycotoxin, vomitoxin, look like a virtual non-issue. Aflatoxin is one of the most potent acute toxins known and one of the most carcinogenic.  Because of this the average international tolerance for aflatoxin B1 in food is 4 parts per billion (PPB).  The average tolerance for food for children is 0.2 PPB and for milk 0.05 PPB (USDA ERS publication source for this data).  These are seriously low numbers.  I want to accurately represent the seriousness of this risk.  

At the same time I also want to accurately represent the extent to which the commercial food supply is now protected from that risk.  The same ERS document above reported US crop losses in 2003 from mycotoxins in corn, wheat and peanuts of $932 million and another $466 million for testing.  That is all for preventing this toxin from getting to us. There is a lot going on in the background that few people recognize.

Folks in the food industry may well ask “why even bring it up!?”  First of all, this is no secret.  My Google Alert for “Aflatoxin” sends me articles nearly every day.  Also I raise this issue to try to “calibrate risk.”  I saw an entry in a comment string on another blog the other day where someone wrote, “I hope this is a move towards chemical-free food.”  I’ll give that person the benefit of the doubt that they know that all food is made of chemicals (proteins, fats, carbs…).  Their concern was about synthetic pesticide residues.  I doubt that they know about “chemicals” like aflatoxin.  They should.  It is thousands of times more toxic than a typical pesticide residue.

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Just about this time last year I reported on the very promising and innovative Mcgyan® biodiesel process. It was one of the most popular stories gas 2.0 ran that year, and rightly so: the breakthrough seemed to deliver the possibility of making biodiesel in mere seconds from start to finish, reducing costs by half the price of other biodiesel, producing no waste, using no chemical reactants, and using any animal fat or vegetable oil as a feedstock.

At the time the company in charge of the project, Ever Cat fuels, had only succeeded at making a small-scale pilot operation of 50,000 gallons per year. But, as of 2 days ago, the process has been completely commercialized.

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The demise of retail giant Filene’s Basement may have a positive effect on proponents of vertical urban farming and algae biofuels alike. Since 2007, the developers of a Filene’s site in downtown Boston have been unable to find funding to move the project forward. But now Höweler + Yoon Architecture and their partner Squared have put forth a proposal to erect a temporary vertical, modular, algae bioreactor high-rise in its place.

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This is one of those topics I’m just not sure what to think of…

When the average person hears the term fuel cell, typically what comes to mind is something that mysteriously makes electricity from hydrogen. In reality the process isn’t all that mysterious—basically the hydrogen is split into its component parts (electrons and protons) and the protons are allowed to flow through the cell, but the electrons are forced to travel another path, which creates the current (and charges the battery or runs the motors or turns on the lights).

Although the hydrogen fuel cell is the most common type of cell, you can make fuel cells that use many different things, including hydrocarbons and sugars. They all work on the same basic principal, but hydrogen fuel cells are considered superior because their only emission is water vapor and they produce lots of energy.

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A team of researchers at MIT are engineering a strain of bacteria, which is similar to the type that causes tuberculosis, to produce biofuel.

The researchers say that the bacteria are useful because they are hungry for a number of sugars and toxic compounds and produce lipids that can be converted to biodiesel.

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