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The River Thames Has a Drug Problem

As London’s urban population continues to grow, improper wastewater management increases exponentially. Every major and growing city has experienced at one point or another an imminent need to update its sewer systems in order to accommodate the waste influx. In London, this issue is acutely prominent due to improper disposal of sanitary products and the […]

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Spotted Lanternflies Spotted

First, you must identify the bug. Is it red when its wings are open? Is it brown with dark brown spots when its wings are closed? If so, you’ve found yourself a spotted lanternfly. What can you do about it? As they are an invasive species, they must go. You open the cabinet beneath the […]

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Plight to Flight: The Bald Eagle Recovery Story

Up in the San Bernardino Mountains of Southern California stands a tree on the shore of Big Bear Lake. 145 feet up the trunk of the Jeffrey pine and nestled in between branches is a large nest in which a bald eagle roosts. Her deep brown feathers blend in with the nest’s sticks, twigs, and […]

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A New Worry: Microplastics in Human Placenta

In a study released out of Italy on December 2, 2020, researchers found microplastics embedded in human placenta, exposing an entirely new concern surrounding improper plastic disposal.  About 320 million tons of plastic are produced annually around the world, 40% of which are single-use and thus cannot be recycled. Often, people improperly dispose of these […]

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Solar Roadways: Revolutionary or Infeasible?

In 2014, Scott Brusaw, an electrical engineer from Sandpoint, Idaho, told the world about his idea to revolutionize energy generation and transportation in a YouTube video called “Solar FREAKIN’ Roadways.” Scott Brusaw and his wife Julie co-founded the company Solar Roadways, intending to replace every road in America with hexagonal interconnecting solar panels, generating clean […]

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Can Revenue From Trophy Hunters Save Zimbabwe’s Elephants?

Last November, President Trump announced the reversal of a 2014 ban on elephant trophy imports from Zimbabwe and Zambia. Following backlash from animal rights and conservation activists, Trump placed the reversal on hold two days later “until such time as I review all conservation facts.” African elephants remain an endangered and dwindling species – the […]

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America’s Newest National Park: Conservation, Tourism, and Accessibility

In late 2020, America gained a new addition to its beloved National Park System as West Virginia gained its first. New River Gorge National Park and Preserve expands over 53 square miles of land, featuring steep cliffs as high as 1,600 feet carved by the flowing turquoise New River, the second oldest river in the […]

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Which Plant-Based Milk is Best for the Environment?

The plant-based milk industry has expanded dramatically in recent years due to increases in the popularity of vegan milk options, which are usually made from plants like almonds, soybeans, and oats. While dairy milk sales are declining at a rate of 3% each year, sales of plant-based milk have grown 6% in just the past […]

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GMOs: Real Risks and Rewards

In America, it’s impossible to have a conversation about our food and where it comes from without talking about genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Selective breeding–where organisms with desired traits are bred together to amplify those traits–is technically a type of genetic modification, but GMOs usually refer to cases where the desired genes are removed from […]

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Increasing Anthropogenic Noise Drowning Out the Whales

Whales are very vocal creatures; from singing Humpback Whales to chirping dolphins, cetaceans are in constant, vocal communication with each other and their surroundings. Baleen Whales, like Blue Whales, Humpback Whales, and Fin Whales, tend to use low-frequency sounds to communicate, usually less than 1 kHz. These low-frequency sounds travel great distances underwater without losing […]