Saturday Quote: Everything that glitters is plastic. It awakened the diversity of trees. the gravity basin in which we live

This week, astronomers considered whether dark energy changes over cosmic time scales. Through neutron analysis, physicists have revealed that some early Iron Age swords have recently been altered by fraudsters to make them more historically exciting. Now a New Jersey professor has solved two fundamental problems that have puzzled mathematicians for decades. There were also developments in craft supplies for children, carbon sequestration, and changes in the map of the universe.

Glitter has been solved

Researchers at the University of Melbourne have solved the glitter problem. Well, there are many problems associated with glitter, including spills on carpets, children’s crafts, and overly fancy cosmetics, but the specific problem we’re talking about here is that glitter with particle sizes less than 5 millimeters is considered microplastic. It is the brightest of all pollutants.

Microplastics are toxic to marine life and are often consumed by land animals, causing a variety of problems such as starvation and gastrointestinal abrasions. And unlike sources like degraded plastic bottles or car body panels, glitter is actually dumped directly from containers, such as construction paper covered in glue or participants in New York’s annual Mermaid Parade. It is made in

The glitter is made of PET (polyethylene terephthalate). The European Union has actually banned glitter, and Australian researchers have recognized the urgency of sustainable, biodegradable glitter for humanity, and are using it to create sustainable, environmental materials such as wood and grass. Introducing glitter made from cellulose, which is similar to They developed cellulose nanocrystals that glow under light and decompose harmlessly in the environment.

The researchers tested both traditional glitter and eco-glitter, which uses Collembola, a microorganism that lives in the soil. Researchers have found for the first time that traditional glitter reduces fertility by 61% at concentrations consistent with environmental pollution by microplastics. This is evidence that microplastics are degrading soil and the organisms that enrich it. However, the cellulose glow had no measurable effect on Collembola.

DEI Forests are good at carbon sequestration

Trees absorb carbon dioxide, right? Therefore, growing arboreal monocultures seems like an easy approach to climate change. Plant hundreds of thousands of acres with, say, the London plane tree, the most common tree in New York City, and let nature solve our unmanageable addiction to fossil fuel consumption. London plane trees grow quickly and quickly sequester large amounts of carbon. But as it turns out, a “set it and forget it” approach to forestry sequesters less carbon than a diverse forest containing a variety of tree species with different growth rates and lifespans.

Fast-growing trees can absorb carbon from the atmosphere faster, but because they have shorter lifespans, they store less carbon over their lifetime and release it into the atmosphere more quickly. Slow-growing species that live longer and grow larger absorb more carbon, especially in forests with a wide variety of trees, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Birmingham. The researchers analyzed measurements of 1,127 tree species across the Americas. The census covers life expectancies from about 1 year to 3,000 years and identifies the life cycles of four types of trees, many of which grow within the same region.

Co-author Dr. Adrian Esquivel-Muelberto said: “Forests with a diverse range of tree species can capture carbon more effectively. In other words, by promoting forest biodiversity in forests, we can capture more carbon. Understanding how these factors are related can help guide restoration and conservation projects.”Choosing the right combination of tree species can maximize carbon storage. Strategies could be developed to strengthen forests’ resilience to climate change. ”

Neighborhood large

Astronomers once believed that the Milky Way existed within a vast structure called the Local Supercluster, which contained thousands of galaxies. But in 2014, studies of galaxy motion provided new images showing that we are actually located in an even larger structure called the Laniakea supercluster, along with about 100,000 other galaxies. It was done.

Now, according to a recent redshift study by astronomers at the University of Hawaii, researchers say Laniakea is likely part of a much larger structure called the Shapley Concentration, which is bound by gravity. They believe that the universe is attracting itself, rather than expanding with the universe.

Shapley is about 10 times larger than Laniakea and forms a “gravitational basin,” a cosmic structure that contains enough material to exert gravitational effects on other structures. The entire Local Group, including the Milky Way, is moving toward Shapley, and the challenge for researchers is to determine how far the superstructure’s gravitational influence extends.

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