Ultimate weapon in fight against plastic pollution — worms!
As the world vanishes under a mountain of plastic, scientists have found a more popular way of getting rid of the waste than a plastic bag tax — worms.
The team from the US and China discovered the larvae of Tenebrio molitor, also known as yellow mealworms, can digest even previously thought non-biodegradable plastics such as Styrofoam.
According to the research, the microorganisms in their guts degrade the plastic into carbon dioxide and transform this into nutrition for the worms.
The researchers fed 100 mealworms between 34 and 39 milligrams of Styrofoam. The worms converted about half of the Styrofoam into carbon dioxide, as they would with any food source. Within 24 hours, they excreted the bulk of the remaining plastic as biodegraded fragments that look similar to tiny rabbit droppings.
Researchers say that their waste appeared to be safe to use as soil for crops. The findings were published in the peer-reviewed scientific journal Environmental Science & Technology.
Female player Brenda Perez disguises herself as a man!
One of the biggest accusations aimed at women’s football is that the players are not good enough and the matches are not as exciting compared to the male equivalent.
But in a social experiment, Brenda Perez smashed those myths after getting disguised as a man — before running rings around the apparently oblivious men.
Brenda, 21, who is a professional player who has featured for Espanyol and Valencia ladies teams in recent years, spent seven hours in make up before kick-off, to become male player Dani Perez.
It included putting on a facial mask, fake stubble and other make up to complete the look, before she entered the pitch in a Spanish amateur match.
The footage was filmed for Spanish TV show El Hormiguero, where Brenda said she wanted to ‘destroy some of the myths’ around women’s football.
In the end, she reveals herself as a woman, to the surprise of those who had struggled to mark her during the game.
Sources: http://www.mirror.co.uk;metro.co.uk; www.upi.com/
Published in Dawn, Young World, December 19th, 2015
