Chemistry
- Chemistry
Pollutants: Up in flames
Forest fires have the potential to release toxic industrial and agricultural pollutants previously trapped on soil. After glomming onto smoke particles, these chemicals can hitch long-distance rides — sometimes across oceans — before they’re grounded and contaminate some new region, scientists report.
- Chemistry
Elusive triangular snowflakes explained
Dust particles,wind and aerodynamics could steer some snowflakes toward a three-sided fate
- Chemistry
Metal gives pigment the blues
Researchers studying manganese oxides unexpectedly discover a new way to achieve blue hue.
- Earth
Toxic playgrounds
No kid should ever play in arsenic. Especially at school. Yet many probably do, according to findings of a study presented today.
- Chemistry
PCBs: When green paint isn’t ‘green’
It seems we're literally painting the air -- from the Great Lakes to Antarctica -- with persistent pollutants. Including at least one whose safety has never been studied.
- Chemistry
Case of the toxic gingerbread man
Featured blog: A search for the source of some indoor-air anomalies turns up a surprising culprit.
- Life
Hormones give lantern sharks the glow
In a first, a study shows that bioluminescence can be controlled by slow-acting hormones, not rapid-fire nerve cells.
- Earth
Nanoparticles’ indirect threat to DNA
Tiny metal nanoparticles can damage DNA, essentially by triggering toxic gossip.
- Chemistry
Aerosols cloud the climate picture
A NASA model incorporates how atmospheric aerosols and greenhouse gases interact, yielding better estimates of the gases' warming and cooling effects.
- Chemistry
How leaves could monitor pollution
Trees near high-traffic areas accumulate tiny particles.
- Chemistry
Tongue’s sour-sensing cells taste carbonation
A protein splits carbon dioxide to give fizz its unique flavor.
- Life
Fly pheromones can say yes and no
A new study begins to decode pheromone messages and finds that the same chemicals that attract can also maintain the species barrier.
