Many communities use aerial spraying to tackle widespread insect problems. From gypsy moths to spruce budworm, pesticides have played a role in reducing a range of different organisms. But people living in affected areas have expressed mounting concerns about the potential health effects and environmental impacts of this approach. Alternatives may be on the horizon.

The state of California has just announced the end of residential aerial spraying to combat light brown apple moth infestations. Instead, they will implement a biological control method, where millions of sterile moths are released.

---

 

Humans love things that smell nice. We do not like things that smell bad. For those reasons, it is easy to see why air fresheners are a multi-billion dollar industry around the world. Every single day, thousands, if not millions of people buy air fresheners so that they can make their homes smell like the mountains, beach, or lake.

However, there is a dark side to those smells and it comes in the form of particles call phthalates. These are little particle substances that are found in most air fresheners on the market. In fact, a study last year by the Natural Resource Defense Council (NRDC) found that of the 14 air fresheners they bought at a local Walgreens, 12 had varying amounts of phthalates in them.

The reason there are phthalates in fragrances is because these nifty little particles have the ability to dissolve and carry the fragrances, which is an integral part in using the air fresheners in your home. On the flip side, those nice smells come at the cost of health problems from phthalates, which can include cancer and developmental problems in children.

---

A recent study indicates that that rapid urbanization will affect the future of plants and animals and availability natural resources. The implications for city planners are ominous. If cities are planned without any regard for nature, then nature will die. As per a United Nations Report, presently, 50% of the population of the world is living in cities. This will increase to 60% by 2030. Nearly 2 billion people will be added to the existing population in the cities. These will be people who will migrate from rural areas. Most of this growth is going to happen in India, Africa and China and countries that are ecologically rich like islands and sea coasts. This kind of lopsided growth will put these areas at risk.

---

A team of European scientists has discovered what may be an Earth-like planet, capable of sustaining life, orbiting a red dwarf star in the constellation Libra. The smallest planet yet discovered, it has a mass of about 5 times that of Earth and, depending on unknown variables like density and how much light the planet reflects, its surface could contain water and average a comfortable zero to forty degrees Celsius. Dimitar Sasselov of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics told the New York Times that the find is especially exciting because, not only is it close enough for humans to travel to someday, it "basically tells you these kinds of planets are very common." The planet, he said, is probably very stable geologically, meaning it could be even friendlier to life than Earth is.

Source: Dennis Overbye, New Planet Could Be Earthlike, Scientists Say. New York Times, April 25, 2007. Photo: Artist's rendering of Gliese 581 as seen from the newly-discovered planet. Image © ESO.

---

With the number of blogs, message boards, discussion groups, and personal websites out there these days, there’s bound to be a whole lot of human emotion floating around on the internet. Jonathan Harris has taken all of this emotion and created computer art out of it. “We Feel Fine” is a program he created that tracks all of the sentences on the web at any given time that contain the words “I feel...” The program then takes the sentence and gathers information about the person who wrote it— their geographical location, the time it was written, their age and gender, as well as any photos that are associated with that sentence and the weather in that location at that time. Then it turns the emotion into a ball of colour which the user can manipulate in various, extremely artistic, unusual, and interesting ways (check it out).

---

I love tofu. I love knitting. Imagine my surprise when during one of my yarn gathering expeditions, I discovered that my stir-fry and stitches had more in common than just my affection.

Companies such as the South West Trading Company have re-introduced the concept of soy as a wearable, useable fibre. The first person in America to laud the silky strength of the material was none other than Henry Ford. A photo of the legendary businessman and corporate strategist wearing a suit made entirely of soy can be found on South West’s website.

From an environmental perspective, soy has many benefits. It is an abundant crop in Asia, and the by-products from the production of tofu can be easily spun into beautiful silky strands for sweaters, scarves and mittens. Soy protein is isolated from the tofu remnants, then liquefied into long flat strands.

---

For many years the earth's oceans and marine life have largely been exploited by people. Rapid advances in science and technology have implied that the level of pollution and exploitation has dwarfed nature's ability to maintain a balance. The potential consequences of this are great; with the imposing threat of global warming, this problem if left unchecked will see far reaching consequences everyone who depends on the ocean.

---

It's time for Doug Wood to take a bow. Why, you may ask? Doug Wood is an inventor. To some he could be a 'garage scientist' pottering about with knickknacks and dreaming about the next big patent. For other's his simple spark of innovativeness could solve their rising energy costs. It looks deceptively like a DIY radio telescope searching for life out in the black yonder, but actually is a solar collector; harnessing the one thing we have in abundance - the sun's rays. And Doug Wood's design is as DIY (Do-It-Yourself) as it comes.

---

Looking for a way to cut down on your paper consumption? Even with e-mail and other electronic information systems, there’s often something that needs to be printed onto paper. Not to mention sending cards on special occasions (not everyone’s granny can receive e-cards), notebooks, and other stationery. There are several alternatives to standard wood cellulose paper, including a variety of different plant fibres, but several companies are offering to turn waste into paper.

The Great Elephant Poo Poo Paper Company Limited uses a novel source for its products. Yes, you guessed it - elephant dung. But don’t be alarmed, as the process delivers an odourless product.

---

Everyday we hear new words being coined thanks to the strides in technology. We look at the innovations to be all pervasive with a very short life span and thanks to that we now have a new problem called e-waste.

E-waste is the dump of all the precious computers, printers, audio devices, unusable game consoles, and mobile phones that we love to throw away, which often end up as massive landfills and pollute our land, water and air with harmful toxins like lead, cadmium and mercury. The United States alone sends more than 5 million tons of e-waste to its landfills every year, and the number keeps growing every year.

---