Gleanings of the Week Ending November 8, 2025

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Childhood Exposure to Plastic Raises Lifetime Health Risks - Scientists analyzed decades of research into the impact on pregnant mothers, fetuses, and children of three chemical additives — phthalates, bisphenols, and perfluoroalkyl substances — that make plastic more flexible, more rigid, or more resistant to heat or water. Early exposure to these chemicals can leave children at greater risk of heart disease, obesity, infertility, and asthma well into adolescence and adulthood. Plastic additives are also believed to affect the development of the brain, with studies linking the chemicals to lower IQ, ADHD, and autism. The widespread use of plastic is exacting a deepening toll, with Americans paying an estimated $250 billion yearly to treat ailments linked to plastic.

Scientists Resurrect 40,000-Year-Old Microbes from Alaskan Permafrost. What They Found Raised Worries About the Future of a Warming Arctic - Roughly 40,000 years ago, microbes went dormant in a rock-like layer of frozen soil near the future site of Fairbanks, Alaska. Now, researchers have successfully “reawakened” the tiny creatures, raising concerns about how those microbes could increase greenhouse gas emissions in a warming Arctic.

The Butterflies of Marinduque: Small Wings, Big Changes - Marinduque supplies about 85% of the Philippine’s butterfly pupae exports. Beyond trade, butterflies have become symbols of livelihood, culture, and conservation for the island.

A simple fatty acid could restore failing vision - Retinal polyunsaturated fatty acid supplementation reverses aging-related vision decline in mice….and systemic lipid supplementation could potentially counteract the effects of age on the immune system. But will in work in humans…that’s still TBD.

Is it possible to lose weight on an 'Ozempic' diet? – Study findings suggest that there's some kind of mechanism we can tap into to restore healthy eating without drugs by limiting the sense of reward and achieving a sense of satisfaction without overeating.

This Chilling Recording Reveals Large Bats Catching, Killing and Eating Birds Midflight – How the greater noctule bat, the largest bat species in Europe, catches and eats its prey.

Fentanyl overdoses among seniors surge 9,000% — A hidden crisis few saw coming - Fatal overdoses among adults 65 and older involving fentanyl mixed with stimulants such as cocaine and methamphetamines have risen dramatically, climbing 9,000% in the past eight years. The rate now mirrors that seen in younger adults. The rise in fentanyl deaths involving stimulants in older adults began to sharply rise in 2020, while deaths linked to other substances stayed the same or declined. Cocaine and methamphetamines were the most common stimulants paired with fentanyl among the older adults studied, surpassing alcohol, heroin, and benzodiazepines such as Xanax and Valium.

Billions of bacteria lurk in your shower, just waiting to spray you in the face - should you be worried? - For most people the risk of catching a bug from your shower head is low, particularly if you are using it frequently. Running the shower for 60-90 seconds, allowing it warm up before stepping under the spray, also means it is also doing some useful work in that time, flushing out many of the microbes. This is particularly advisable after a holiday or any long gap between using the shower. Regular cleaning by running very hot water through the shower, along with descaling your shower head or soaking it in lemon juice can help to disrupt the microbes living there and control the size of biofilms.

Dolphins may be getting Alzheimer’s from toxic ocean blooms - Dolphins washing up on Florida’s shores may be victims of the same kind of brain degeneration seen in humans with Alzheimer’s disease. Researchers discovered that cyanobacterial toxins—worsened by climate change and nutrient pollution—accumulate in marine food chains, damaging dolphin brains with misfolded proteins and Alzheimer’s-like pathology. Since dolphins are considered environmental sentinels for toxic exposures in marine environments there are concerns about human health issues associated with cyanobacterial blooms. In 2024, Miami Dade County had the highest prevalence of Alzheimer's disease in the United States.

Nigeria, a Major Oil Producer, Sees Beginnings of a Solar Boom - For Nigerians, the cost savings from ditching diesel mean that a solar panel pays for itself within six months. Homeowners who can afford the up-front costs are installing rooftop solar in large numbers, while some villages are setting up community solar and battery projects. Solar is making huge gains in Nigeria, with imports of Chinese solar panels growing by two-thirds between June 2024 and June 2025. n Pakistan, high fuel prices, a byproduct of the Ukraine war and the loss of a fuel subsidy, have spurred the mass adoption of solar.

Stunning Microscope Videos Highlight Self-Pollination, Algae and Tumor Cells in the Nikon Small World in Motion Contest – The first and fifth were my favorites of these short videos.

Gleanings of the Week Ending June 28, 2025

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Meet the Kangaroos That Live in Trees - Filling an evolutionary niche akin to monkeys, they’re keystone species in the rainforests of New Guinea and Australia.

Manet Cut This Painting in Half 150 Years Ago. Now, the Two Sides Are Back Together for a Rare Reunion - In 1874, Manet began to paint a scene of the Brasserie Reichshoffen on a large canvas. Unlike his paintings of military scenes or upper-class life of the 1860s, the new piece captured the dramas of everyday life. But Manet became dissatisfied with the composition of the large work and opted to cut the canvas in two. Over the next few years, he refined each half into more concise, if slightly less ambitious, depictions of the same café: At the Café and Corner of a Café-Concert. While both paintings are well regarded, Manet’s contemporaries struggled to understand his decision to separate them. But Manet’s conviction that the two should be kept apart remained strong. When the two paintings of the same café were exhibited at the Triennial Salon in Antwerp in 1879, they were shown in separate rooms.

Deconstructing Buildings: The Quest for New Life for Old Wood - A growing number of cities have launched initiatives to reuse the wood waste from construction and demolition that now ends up in landfills. The challenge, proponents say, is to deploy new techniques for disassembling old buildings and markets for repurposing the salvaged wood. Using reclaimed wood in buildings stores carbon and helps reduce emissions by avoiding the need to cut new trees. Going forward, some architects say, buildings should be designed for disassembly — meaning every structure is built not only to last but also for easy dismantling and repurposing when its time is up.

Why the appendix is much more important than we once thought - The appendix has been shown to be an important component of immune function, especially in early life. In addition, the appendix itself contains a very diverse and varied microbiota distinct from other parts of the gastrointestinal tract, suggesting a specialized role. Removal of the appendix has been associated with a reduction in gut bacterial diversity which can lead to intestinal dysbiosis and potentially increase susceptibility to various diseases. Appendectomy has also been linked to an increase in fungal diversity in the gut; the appendix may play a role in the balance between bacterial and fungal populations, potentially acting as a store of commensal gut microbiota that repopulate the colon after exposure to pathogens or antibiotic treatment. The appendix may play a further role in protecting the gastrointestinal system from invading pathogens.

How Extreme Heat Impacts Children - Infants and young children sweat less and are unable to regulate their core body temperature as well as adults. Playgrounds are not always built with materials designed to withstand heat and prevent burns. Older children such as high school athletes face increased risk of heatstroke and other illnesses during practices and games. 

Weather makers: How microbes living in the clouds affect our lives - Trillions of bacteria, fungi, viruses and single-celled organisms travel the globe high in the atmosphere. Current aerobiologists deploy sophisticated air-samplers on drones and use DNA-sequencing technology to identify airborne life by its genes. The aerobiome, researchers now recognize, is an enormous habitat filled only with visitors. By one estimate about a trillion trillion bacterial cells rise each year from the land and sea into the sky. By another estimate, 50 million tons of fungal spores become airborne in that same time. Untold numbers of viruses, lichen, algae and other microscopic life forms also rise into the air. It's common for them to travel for days before landing, in which time they can soar for hundreds or thousands of miles. The aerobiome is a force to be reckoned with – one that exerts a powerful influence on the chemistry of the atmosphere. It even alters the weather. It turns out that biological molecules and cell walls are exceptionally good at triggering rain. More sobering… In a 2023 survey of clouds, bacteria carrying 29 different kinds of resistance genes were found.  A single airborne bacterium may carry as many as nine resistance genes, each providing a different defense against drugs. Every cubic meter of cloud could hold up to 10,000 resistance genes. A typical cloud floating overhead may hold more than a trillion of them.

The New Normal Is Already a Loss: How Shifting Baselines Skew Our View of Nature - Think back on the bird song you woke up to this morning. You might have pulled out a few recognizable threads, perhaps the robin, the crow, the sparrow. Now imagine what morning might have sounded like to your grandparents. Major scientific studies indicate that it was likely a cacophony of song by comparison—many kinds of birds and more of them. The difference, the shift in normal, is gradual over time and the loss, without memory or data, is hard to define. With each generation, our perception of the natural world changes, and with it, our understanding of what accounts for abundance and loss of biodiversity. A term bandied about is the “new normal.” In ecology, it’s called the shifting baseline syndrome. 

Fungi to the Rescue: How Mushrooms Are Helping Clean Up Toxic Lands - Mycoremediation, the use of fungi to break down pollutants and absorb heavy metals from contaminated soil. Certain species can transform petrochemicals, pesticides, and heavy metals into harmless compounds or concentrate them for safer removal. This nature-based method offers an affordable, less disruptive alternative to traditional “dig and dump” remediation approaches.

A History of Some National Park Roads – The only roads mentioned in the article I haven’t experienced is Generals Highway in California and Going-to-the-Sun Road in Montana!

The Famous, Feathered Dinosaur Archaeopteryx Could Fly, Suggests New Study of a ‘Beautifully Preserved’ Fossil - A fossil collector discovered the Chicago Archaeopteryx sometime before 1990 in limestone deposits near Solnhofen, Germany, where all known Archaeopteryx fossils originate. As the Field Museum’s preparators worked on the pigeon-sized Chicago Archaeopteryx, they realized that the fossil included more soft tissues and delicate skeletal details than any other known Archaeopteryx specimen. From previous fossils, they already knew the dinosaur had asymmetric feathers, which are vital to creating thrust in modern, flying birds. But the hard slab of limestone around this specimen had also preserved a key layer of feathers called tertials that had never been documented before in Archaeopteryx.

Gleanings of the Week Ending October 19, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Antarctic 'greening' at dramatic rate - Vegetation cover across the Antarctic Peninsula has increased more than tenfold over the last four decades… fundamental changes to the biology and landscape of this iconic and vulnerable region.

Is cleaning with baking soda better for the environment? – Maybe not…and it might not be very good at some types of cleaning either.

Meet Milagra, a Rare Condor Rescued as an Egg and Newly Released Back into the Wild – A success at Arizona’s Vermilion Cliffs National Monument.

Landslides, Thousands Of Downed Trees, Undercut Roads Along Blue Ridge Parkway – Lots of repairs for the National Park Service after Hurricane Helene. Some damage is severe enough (i.e. more than just clearing mudslides and debris) that it will take time to repair. The fall foliage will come and go.

In Search of Microbes That Weave Colors into Moroccan Carpets - A scientist’s quest for microbes that produce purple pigments led to the vibrant world of natural dyes for women in the Atlas Mountain region of Morocco creating sought after traditional woven carpets…it’s a great intersection of biology and traditional artistry! The findings are compiled into a 48-page open-source guidebook, also translated into English, which described their project, introduced microbial dyeing, and catalogued recipes for plant dyes.

Dementia diagnostic markers change with time of day - Biomarker levels (p-tau217) were at their lowest in the morning when participants woke and highest in the evening.

Great Lakes Water Quality Project Seeks to Restore Coastal Vegetation - Returning certain croplands to perennial vegetation to reduce runoff and limit erosion.

'A warmer, sicker world': Mosquitoes carrying deadly diseases are on an unstoppable march across the US - West Nile virus, Eastern equine encephalitis (EEE), malaria and dengue…The mosquitoes that carry these diseases are thriving in a warming world.

Extinct Volcanoes Could Be Source of Key Metals Needed for Clean Tech - Rare-earths lurking under extinct volcanoes may be easier to extract. The iron-rich magma that formed some extinct volcanoes would be up to 100 times more efficient at concentrating rare-earths than the magma found in active volcanoes today. By one estimate, demand for rare-earths is set to grow fivefold by the end of this decade so finding them closer to home could contribute to more rapid conversion to clean technologies.

See Newly Discovered Nazca Drawings That Depict Llamas, Human Sacrifices and More - With the help of artificial intelligence, researchers have found hundreds of ancient artworks carved into the pebbled ground of Peru’s Nazca Desert in 6 months compared to 430 found between 1927 up to before the use of AI.

Gleanings of the Week Ending June 1, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

How Storm King Art Center Became One of World’s Top Sculpture Parks – Adding to my list to consider seeing if I travel to New York (state).

Dirt Cheap Batteries Enable Megawatt-Scale Charging Without Big Grid Upgrades Right Away – Hope the technology trend continues…that this idea helps us transition to more electric trucks and other vehicles.

Extreme Birding: Shorebirds at the Sewage Lagoon – Maybe a great place for birding….if you can stand the smell. The same thing happens at landfills.

The human brain has been shrinking – and no-one quite knows why - The brains of modern humans are around 13% smaller than those of Homo sapiens who lived 100,000 years ago. Exactly why is still puzzling researchers. I was a little surprised that the authors did NOT consider the challenge of birthing babies with larger heads (i.e. until C-sections allowed mother and baby to survive if the baby’s head was too large, both mother and baby died) which would result in natural selection of genes for smaller heads.

Climate change is most prominent threat to pollinators - Pollinator populations are declining worldwide and 85% of flowering plant species and 87 of the leading global crops rely on pollinators for seed production. The decline of pollinators seriously impacts biodiversity conservation, reduces crop yield, and threatens food security. Changes in water and temperature associated with climate change can lower the quantity and quality of resources available to pollinators, decrease the survival of larvae or adults, and modify suitable habitats.

The deep ocean photographer that captured a 'living fossil' – In 2010, Laurent Ballesta was the first diver to photograph a living coelacanth. In 2013, Ballesta and his team returned and encountered multiple coelacanths, spending up to half an hour in their presence. Thanks to Ballesta's work, we now know the coelacanth is among the longest-living fish species, with a lifespan of around 100 years, and has one of the slowest life histories of all marine fish – so, like deep-sea sharks with a reduced metabolism, the coelacanth grows slowly, taking as long as 69 years to reach sexual maturity, and with a gestation period of around five years.

Under stress, an observer is more likely to help the victim than to punish the perpetrator - It takes more cognitive effort to punish others than it does to help them. Studies show that when witnessing an act of injustice while stressed, people tend to behave selflessly, preferring to help the victim than to punish the offender.

Stunning Aerial Photos Capture the Abstract Beauty of Iceland’s Glacier Rivers – Iceland….blue.

These tricks make wind farms more bird-friendly – Migratory birds can crash into wind turbines…but there are ways to reduce the carnage: adding high visibility reflectors and spirals to cables, not building wind farms in flight paths, painting one blade on each turbine black (or stripes of black on each blade), and sound.

Swarms of miniature robots clean up microplastics and microbes, simultaneously – Interesting idea. While the bots were decontaminated and reused…they were not as effective…so more work is needed.