HS-ESS3-4
Evaluate or refine a technological solution that reduces impacts of human activities on natural systems.
- Health & Medicine
U.S. to outlaw antibacterial soaps
Soaps with germ-killing compounds promise cleaner hands. But manufacturers couldn’t show they offer any safety advantage. Now the U.S. government is banning them.
- Earth
Scientists Say: Plastisphere
As plastic floats in the ocean, it can acquire its own colony of microbes and algae. We call this ecosystem the plastisphere.
- Climate
Volcanic rocks can quickly turn pollution into stone
A test program in Iceland injected carbon dioxide into lava rocks. More than 95 percent of the gas turned to stone within two years.
- Animals
Teens use science to worm through plastic waste
Some beetle larvae can eat plastic, which might be good for our pollution problem. But which types eat the most can vary a lot, these young scientists find.
- Animals
Catching ‘Dory’ fish can poison entire coral reef ecosystems
More than half of saltwater-aquarium fish sold in the United States may have been caught in the wild using cyanide, new data show.
- Earth
Fighting big farm pollution with a tiny plant
Fertilizer runoff can fuel the growth of toxic algae nearby lakes. A teen decided to harness a tiny plant to sop up that fertilizer.
- Chemistry
Concrete science
Teen researchers are exploring ways to strengthen this building material, use it for safety purposes and use its discarded rubble.
- Climate
Zapping clouds with lasers could alter Earth’s climate
Scientists zapped ice crystals in a lab. They were exploring whether this approach might be used to break those crystals in clouds — potentially as a way to cool Earth’s fever.
- Earth
Common water pollutants hurt freshwater organisms
The germ killers we use and the drugs we take don’t just disappear. They can end up in the environment. There they can harm aquatic organisms, three teens showed.
- Earth
Quake risk in some central states rivals California’s
Risks of tremors in some central U.S. states are as high as those in quake-prone California. The reason: waste fluids from oil and gas drilling.
- Earth
Breathing very dirty air may boost obesity risk
Breathing dirty Beijing air made rats heavier and less healthy than rats breathing clean air. Scientists now worry such polluted air may do the same thing to people.
- Climate
Arctic ice travels fast, carrying pollution
Climate change is melting old sea ice in the Arctic. Now, younger, thinner ice is migrating far and fast, taking pollutants with it.
