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Tales of turning water into wine or weaving straw into gold are one thing, but a new study shows that scientists can transform trash into . . . Tylenol? Scientists at the University of Edinburgh were able to convert plastic waste into paracetamol, aka acetaminophen, the active ingredient in the pain reliever Tylenol. Stranger yet, they pulled off the alchemical feat using the bacteria E. coli. Were able to transform a prolific environmental and societal waste into such a globally important medication in a way thats completely impossible, using chemistry alone or using biology alone, says study coauthor Stephen Wallace, a chemical biotechnologist at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. The research team began with polyethylene terephthalate (PET), a common plastic found in food packaging and polyester clothing. Using established chemical methods, they broke down the PET plastic into a precursor molecule and then added it into a cell culture of E. coli that was genetically modified. Enzymes in the modified E. coli bacteria were able to convert the plastic precursor into paracetamol 92% of the time. The transformation relies on a chemical process known as a Lossen rearrangement, which can convert one kind of molecule into a different kind of molecule. Scientists have known about the Lossen rearrangement for more than 100 years, but generally observe the phenomenon in a flask or a test tube. The research group is now working with pharmaceutical makers including AstraZeneca, one of the studys sponsors, to replicate the same chemical transformations on a larger scale. The new research isnt the first to observe the way that bacteria can be deployed to usefully break down plastic. Researchers have previously studied how wastewater bacteria found in urban waterways use a special enzyme to chew up plastic trash and convert it into carbon-based food. As we grapple with the cascading environmental and health effects that decades of proliferating plastics have wrought on the planet, bacteria capable of converting plastic into harmless or even useful molecules is a promising area of research.
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E-Commerce
California Gov. Gavin Newsom filed a lawsuit against Fox News on Friday, accusing the conservative news network of defamation. The suit, which seeks $787 million in damages, argues that coverage on Fox News misrepresented a phone call between Newsom and President Trump in a way designed to damage Newsoms reputation. The phone call in question took place after 1 a.m. on June 7, prior to Trumps activation of the National Guard in California. On June 10, when a reporter asked if he and Newsom had spoken, the president claimed that he had called Newsom a day ago to tell him to do a better job handling protests in Los Angeles. National Guard troops arrived in Los Angeles in the early morning hours of June 8. Newsom disputed Trumps claim that they had spoken the previous day on social media. There was no call, Newsom said. Not even a voicemail. Americans should be alarmed that a president deploying Marines onto our streets doesnt even know who hes talking to. In a prime-time segment, Fox News host Jesse Watters stated that Newsom lied about receiving a phone call from President Trump. The show included a graphic that read Gavin lied about Trumps call and featured an image of Trumps call history with Newsom, showing the June 7 call. Why would Newsom lie and claim Trump never called him? Watters asked during the segment. The lawsuit claims that the mischaracterization of the situation, namely the claim that Newsom lied about having a phone call with Trump, could damage Newsoms political career, which is widely expected to include a run for president. The $787 million that Newsom seeks in damages is no coincidence. Fox News paid that amount to settle a prior defamation lawsuit from voting machine maker Dominion Voting Systems after the network spread debunked conspiracy theories about the companys equipment. Unfortunately, the past two years have shown that the Dominion settlement did not serve as the deterrent many had predicted, as Fox has continued to launder the stream of false information flowing out of the White House, the lawsuit states.
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E-Commerce
A study published this week delves into the mystery of how the plastic objects we interact with daily shed tiny particles that creep into our bodies, brains, and guts. While the scientific focus has long been on how microplastics pollute our environment and impact wildlife, researchers are increasingly raising alarms about how the same contaminants can wreak havoc in the human body. The new research, published in the journal NPJ Science of Food, wove together data from 100 previous papers that studied microplastics, nanoplastics, and plastic particles. The results were compiled into an open database published by the Food Packaging Forum, a Swiss nonprofit that examines chemicals in food packaging. Microplastics and nanoplastics are plastic particles in the millimeter-to-nanometer range, with the latter causing even more concern among scientists because their microscopic size makes them able to slip into human cells. “This is the first systematic evidence map to investigate the role of the normal and intended use of food contact articles in the contamination of foodstuffs with MNPs [microplastics and nanoplastics],” said lead study author Lisa Zimmermann, scientific communication officer at the Food Packaging Forum. “Food contact articles are a relevant source of MNPs in foodstuffs; however, their contribution to human MNP exposure is underappreciated.” How we interact with plastic matters The new study looked at a broad range of food contact articles that included water bottles, cutting boards, food processing equipment, and packaging ranging from food wrappers to tea bags. Most food packaging contains plasticeven many items that seem like they dont, such as the paper that wraps around cold cuts and cheese, cardboard takeout containers, and glass bottles and jars, which often have a plastic-coated closure. The authors focused on how everyday objects used as intended can shed microplastics and how that shedding can worsen over the course of repeated interactions. Across 14 different studies, microplastic shedding was found to increase with repeated uses, including screwing a reusable water bottle lid on and off, washing a melamine dish, or putting plastic tableware into contact with hot foods. These findings are relevant for reused plastic [food contact articles] and should be considered when assessing the safety of FCAs across use cycles, the authors wrote. Based on their research, and its blind spots, they stressed the need for future studies to delve more deeply into how repeated interactions, heating, and washing affect the amount of microplastics being shed by kitchenware and food packaging that most of the worlds population might come into contact with countless times each day. The authors also found that the bulk of the research on microplastics focused on only a few kinds of objects that come into contact with food and drinks, like water bottles and tea bags. Similarly, more studies focused on polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and polypropylene over other common plastics, leaving a lot of unknowns about how much plastic is being shed by food packaging made out of other materials. Food and beverage containers can expose the human body to microplastics every time we interact with them but relatively little is still known about how that process works. That mystery is an ominous one, considering how ubiquitous plastics are globally in food packaging and preparation and how their presence is increasingly linked to reproductive, digestive, and respiratory problems, and potentially even colon and lung cancer. Plastics appear to have no trouble finding their way into the human body. Another recent study found that the adult brain can contain a plastic spoons worth of microplastics and nanoplastics, an amount thats seven to 30 times higher than what might be found in the liver or kidneys. Those kind of findings show that its imperative for future research to track down how all of that plastic is finding its way into the human body and what exactly it does once it gets there.
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E-Commerce
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