【推荐1】There is increasing alarm about the extent of micro plastic pollution, which has been found everywhere from Everest to the Arctic. However, it turns out there’s an even smaller and more poisonous form of plastic pollution entering remote reaches of the globe. A new study published in Environmental Research found significant quantities of nanoplastics in ice samples from both the North and South Poles.

“Now we know that nanoplastics are transported to these comers of the Earth in these quantities. This indicates that nanoplastics are really a bigger pollution problem than we thought,” study lead author Dusan Materic said in a press release.

Nanoplastics are plastics that are smaller than a micrometer in size. Their small size means they are more difficult to study than microplastics, or plastics between five millimeters and a micrometer. But they maybe even more dangerous.

“Nanoplastics are very toxicologically active compared to, for instance, microplastics, and that’s why this is very important” Materic said.

Materic and his team used new methods to measure nanoplastic pollution in ice samples from Greenland and Antarctica. They sampled a 14-meter-deep ice core (核) from the Greenland icecap and sea ice from Antarcia’s McMurdo Sound. They found that there were an average of 13.2 nanograms per milliliter of nanoplastics in the Greenland ice and an average of 52.3 nanograms per milliliter in the Antarctic ice.

But what was even more surprising than the amount of nanoplastics in the remote ice was just how long they had sat there. “In the Greenland core, we see nanoplastic pollution happening all the way from the 1960s. So organisms, despite the lack of the solid evidence, likely all over the world, have been exposed to it for quite some time now,” Materic said.

The study also looked at the types of plastic present in the samples. Half of the Greenland nanoplastics were polyethylene (PE), the kind of plastic used for plastic bags and packaging. A quarter came from tires and a fifth were polyethylene terephthalate (PET), which is, used for clothing and bottles.

【推荐3】Traditional Chinese medicine(TCM) is an ancient form of healthcare that dates back over 2,500 years, which aims to prevent or cure disease by maintaining or restoring yinyang balance. Fundamentally, TCM seeks to restore a dynamic balance between two complementary forces, yin(passive) and yang(active) . According to the yinyang theory, a person is healthy when harmony exists between these two forces; illness, on the other hand, results from a breakdown in the balance.

TCM practitioners(从业者) look to treat the root cause of disease and take a holistic approach to helping people experience complete recovery without the use of conventional drugs. TCM is “holistic” because it takes into account all aspects of a patient's life, rather than just several obvious symptoms. TCM practitioners view the body as a complex system, rather than separate organs. They use smell, hearing, touch, and pulse diagnosis(诊断) to discover the source of an unbalanced health condition. In addition, the practitioner typically makes use of what is known as five phases(wuxing) . Using the five-phase theory, the practitioner can create a plan for treatment that might contain such components as herbs, lifestyle changes, and foods for recovery.

Over the past several decades, TCM has been going global. It is now practiced in 183 countries and regions with 86 of them signing agreements with China to promote it. More and more medical schools are now recognizing the importance of training students and staff in “mind-body” practices that emphasize disease prevention and holistic treatments. A study of 3,200 physicians, conducted by Health Products Research, indicates that more than 50 percent of physicians in the U. S. planned to begin or increase use of TCM.

【推荐1】Oumuamua, an object through space that was discovered on October 19th, has already made history. The speed at which it is moving relative to the sun means that it cannot be native to the solar system. Its official name is thus II/2017 UI, with the “I” standing for “interstellar(星际)”—the first time this name has ever been used.

That is exciting. Some scientists, though, entertain an even more exciting possibility: what if Oumuamua is not an asteroid(小行星), as most think, but an alien(外星的) spacecraft? Asteroids come in ll sorts of shapes and sizes, but Oumuamua seems particularly different. As best as astronomers can tell, it is cigarlike, being roughly 180 meters long but only about 30 meters wide. That makes it longer than anything known of in the solar system.Such a shape would be a sensible choice for a spaceship, since it would minimize the scouring(冲刷) effect of interstellar dust.

With that in mind the Breakthrough Listen project, an organization aimed at hunting for alien life, plans to turn the world’s biggest radio telescope, the Green Bank instrument in Virginia, towards Oumuamua to see if it can hear anything interesting. Oumuamua is currently about twice as far from Earth as Earth is from the sun. At that range, the telescope should be sensitive enough to pick up a transmitter about as powerful as a mobile phone after just a few seconds—worthy of observations.

Will it find anything? Almost certainly not.Oumuamua has the same reddish color as many as asteroids, so probably has a similar composition. And, if it really is a spaceship, it is strange that signs of its artificial origin have not been seen already. It could, in theory, be a derelict(遗弃星球). But in that case the telescope is unlikely to hear anything. By far the most likely option is that it is exactly what it seems to be: a huge space rock, one that has come to the solar system from the vast space between the stars.

【推荐2】In July 2021, astronauts on board the International Space Station (ISS) planted pepper seeds as part of an experiment to test which plants could be successfully grown in space. The peppers were harvested four months later, and the team celebrated with a party and taste test.

For astronauts living mostly off prepackaged foods for months at a time on the ISS, fresh and flavourful produce is welcomed. With long missions to the Moon and Mars in focus, NASA is working to find sustainable ways for astronauts to enjoy fresh foods, which will add key nutrients to their diets and improve their state of mind.

Astronauts have grown radishes, zinnias and a variety of lettuces on board the ISS before, but this is the first time they grew peppers, which posed a new challenge, reports Elizabeth Howell for Space. com.

Biologists at the Kennedy Space Centre spent two years picking the perfect pepper. They wanted to try peppers because they’re a great source of vitamins and nutrients, and they can be eaten raw or cooked. Plus, peppers are fairly low maintenance to grow.

In June, a carrier delivered supplies to the ISS along with a package of 48 pepper seeds. Astronauts on board planted the seeds in a microwave oven-sized growing container. The conditions in it—such as lighting, watering and air circulation—were controlled by a crew based at the Kennedy Space Centre. On board, the astronauts collected data and offered feedback on the flavour of the peppers.

“This is important because the food astronauts eat needs to be as good as the rest of their equipment,” LaShelle Spencer, a plant scientist at NASA, said over the summer. “To successfully send people to Mars and bring them back to Earth, we will not only require the most nutritious foods, but the best tasting ones as well.”