Danger Dust

The technology involves assembling heat-absorbing bricks in an insulated container, where they can store heat generated by solar or wind power for later use at the temperatures required for industrial processes. The heat can then be released when needed by passing air through channels in the stacks of "firebricks," thus allowing cement, steel, glass, and paper factories to run on renewable energy even when wind and sunshine are unavailable.

These systems, which several companies have recently begun to commercialize for industrial heat storage, are a form of thermal energy storage. The bricks are made from the same materials as the insulating bricks that lined primitive kilns and iron-making furnaces thousands of years ago. To optimize for heat storage instead of insulation, the materials are combined in different amounts.

Aerosol particles are tiny. Swirling suspended in the air around us, most are smaller than the smallest bug, thinner than the thinnest hair on your head, gossamer specks practically invisible to the naked eye. Newly formed ones are nano-sized. Yet their influence is gargantuan.

They determine the color of sunsets. They inflict over three million premature deaths each year. And the power they hold over our climate is massive.

Aerosol particles come about in different ways. Some, known as primary aerosols, are ejected straight into the atmosphere, like dust from a desert or ash from a volcano. Others are born in the sky, products of gases that intermingle in the atmospheric milieu—these are the particles that claim the EAGLES team's attention.

New particles aren't born just anywhere; there are hotspots. Much of the action happens above forests, like the rainforests of the Central Amazon and Southeast Asia.

There, "clean" air free of primary aerosols allows for the right kind of chemical intermingling that gives way to new particles. Scientists have detected huge concentrations of new particles above these forests.

Global variability in atmospheric new particle formation mechanisms

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07547-1

Researchers at the University of Liège (Belgium) have discovered a new population of macrophages, important innate immune cells that populate the lungs after injury caused by respiratory viruses. These macrophages are instrumental in repairing the pulmonary alveoli.

This groundbreaking discovery promises to revolutionize our understanding of the post-infectious immune response and opens the door to new regenerative therapies.

Published: March 2021

Autoantibodies have been associated with both asbestos exposure and various cancers. Therefore, autoantibodies can be explored as markers of disease or markers of asbestos exposure.

In this study, the relationship between ANA and asbestos-associated cancers was examined, since amphibole asbestos exposures were shown to induce ANA, and because of some evidence that autoimmune responsiveness is associated with, and may play roles in, development of some cancers.

The current study found that those without a cancer diagnosis were significantly (5-fold) more likely to be positive for ANA than cancer patients. This was true for both lung cancer and mesothelioma patients.

Anti-nuclear autoantibodies are strongly associated with, and sometimes diagnostic for, systemic autoimmune diseases including systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), systemic sclerosis, Sjogren Syndrome, and mixed connective tissue disease.

Several investigators reported that ANA also occur in the serum of cancer patients, and the possibility that these autoantibodies may be related to DNA damage and cancer etiology.

Castor oil, which was once used by fascists in Italy as punishment because of its quick-acting laxative effect, is now a weight-loss trend on TikTok. Not drinking it, but rubbing it on your belly.

Influencers are also pouring it in their belly buttons and wrapping towels soaked in it around their midriff. They claim it can melt belly fat and help with bloating.

Castor oil – made from the beans of the castor plant – is an ancient medicine. References to it appear in an ancient Egyptian medical text called the Ebers Papyrus (1550BC). It was used as a laxative and to treat various skin conditions. Cleopatra is said to have used it in her hair and to brighten the whites of her eyes.

The odourless oil is rich in a fatty substance called ricinoleic acid that strongly stimulates bowel movements. 

It is always advised to apply a small amount of pure castor oil or a castor oil-containing cosmetic product onto a small patch of skin. If there is no allergic reaction after 24 hours, then it can be assumed that the product can be applied safely to a larger area of the body.

Ultimately, though, there are generally safer and better remedies out there. And rubbing it on your belly – sadly – won’t melt the fat.

Many of the world’s modern systems of public health surveillance have their origins in innovations Britain introduced in the mid-19th century, including continuous water supply, sewage filtration and routine governmental investigation of disease outbreaks.

And yet Britain has never managed to eradicate systemic failures when it comes to providing safe, clean and accessible drinking water to its citizens. To understand why not, we need to start by revisiting Britain’s major cholera and typhoid outbreaks of the 19th- and early 20th-century, which at their peaks killed hundreds of people every day.

‘The power of life and death’

The colossal power of life and death wielded by a water company supplying half a million customers is something for which, till recently, there has been no precedent in the history of the world. Such a power ought most sedulously to be guarded against abuse.

These prophetic words were written by the British government’s first ever chief medical officer, John Simon, in 1867. He was responding to one of the country’s worst water-related scandals: the 1866 cholera epidemic that killed 5,596 people in the East End of London.

Globally, the full-scale water privatisation of England and Wales remains an exception, other than for a few World Bank-led initiatives in developing economies. Most European countries have opted for a coexistence of private and public bodies.

In England and Wales, selling off water providers as regional monopolies led to unsustainable price hikes, with company after company prioritising shareholders over customers from the get-go.

They’re everywhere. Engineered stone kitchen countertops look good and cost less. But there’s a catch, says Hazards editor Rory O’Neill. The workers making them are being struck at frightening speed by lung-destroying silicosis. In parliament, the UK government insisted “nobody” has been harmed. But down the road, hospital lung specialists are telling a different story.

Over a century after the government first acknowledged it was an occupational disease, the UK is now far behind best practice on silicosis recognition and prevention, with evidence both exposure standards and systems for identifying cases may be dangerously lax.

A January 2023 report from the All Party Parliamentary Group for Respiratory Health urged the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) to look at “the data and technology needed to allow the UK to reduce the WEL [workplace exposure limit] for work with silica to 0.05mg/m3.”

It was a belated recognition from MPs that the UK’s 0.1mg/m3 standard may not be sufficiently protective. HSE admits there will be six times more silicosis cases if it sticks at this level, but has told Hazards repeatedly it has no intention of lowering it. Australia and the US, by contrast, have both completed multi-year consultations and introduced the more protective standard of 0.05mg/m3. In three years, Australia intends to follow global best practice and shift to 0.025mg/m3.

Extreme heat kills over 175,000 people a year in Europe, where temperatures are rising quicker than the rest of the globe, the World Health Organization's (WHO) European branch said Thursday.

Of the some 489,000 heat-related deaths recorded each year by the WHO between 2000 and 2019, the European region accounts for 36 percent or on average 176,040 deaths, the WHO said.

The health body noted that temperatures in the region are "rising at around twice the global average rate."

The WHO's European region comprises 53 countries, including several in Central Asia.

Temperature extremes exacerbate chronic conditions, including cardiovascular, respiratory and cerebro-vascular diseases, mental health, and diabetes-related conditions.

Some foods and alcohol

People who are intoxicated tend to put out more carbon dioxide and sweat more, which seems to attract mosquitoes—possibly along with other unknown factors.

Swiger said diet can also impact mosquito attraction, though the extent of its effect hasn't been fully explored. Garlic and vitamin B are often anecdotally reported to deter these bugs, but the evidence is limited.

However, Swiger said bananas and other high-potassium foods have shown to attract mosquitoes, perhaps because they lead to an increase in lactic acid production in the body, which helps mosquitoes locate animals.

This also impacts a person's skin microbiota, or the microorganisms living on the skin.

A taste for the local flavor

Sometimes mosquitoes develop more specific tastes in a location over time as an evolutionary trait.

"Mosquitoes in certain neighborhoods can become accustomed to specific scents and start to prefer those over others," Swiger said. "Their generations are about two weeks long, and urban mosquitoes that bite humans often don't travel far. As a result, they seem to get familiar with the local scents."

Different groups of TB bacteria exist worldwide with different regional distribution: some are generalists and can be found on many continents, others are very limited in their spread. An international team of researchers has now been able to show for the first time that the specialist strains spread more effectively among suitable hosts from the same geographical area, whereas generalist strains can spread in different host populations from a variety of geographical settings. The transmissibility of tuberculosis therefore depends not only on the pathogen or the host but also on their combination.

A new, comparatively gentle cleanup method reportedly eradicates 100 percent of certain “forever chemicals” overnight by combining a simple chemical solution and visible LED light. The results, published last month in the journal Angewandte Chemie International Edition, also indicate the breakthrough effectively separates fluorine ions for recycling, a key component for clean energy production and pharmaceuticals.

Along with microplastics, poly- and perfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are considered some of today’s most pressing environmental pollutants. Known for their long lifespans as well as their excellent resistance to heat and water, these “forever chemicals” have been found in everything from nonstick cookware, to firefighting foam, to clothing (not to mention inside the human body) since Teflon’s arrival in 1938. Unfortunately, mounting evidence shows PFAS, like their microplastic relatives, cause countless health issues like hormone disruption and cancer. And as their name suggests, these accumulations of “forever chemicals” will linger in environments as remote as Antarctica for generations unless addressed.

Indiana launches effort to study link between firefighter cancer rates and protective gear

The very same gear that protects firefighters from harm also endangers their health. PFAS, also known as “forever chemicals,” have been found in jackets and other layers of protective equipment for first responders.

Exposure to PFAS has been linked to several types of cancer and other health issues. Cancer is the leading cause of occupational death for firefighters. Compared to the general population in the U.S., they have a 9 percent higher chance of having cancer and 14 percent higher chance of dying from it.

Now a new state testing program aims to improve the understanding of the link between PFAS and cancer rates amongst firefighters.

A stonemason who contracted a deadly lung disease after cutting a material popular in kitchen makeovers has called for it to be banned in the UK amid a new wave of global cases in young workers.

Malik Al-Khalil, 31, is among the first UK-based kitchen countertop workers diagnosed with silicosis after inhaling toxic dust from grinding engineered stone.

Speaking from his hospital bed, Mr Al-Khalil, a Syrian refugee who has lived in the UK for 10 years, is the first in the group to go public with his illness, and to call for the new Labour government to issue a ban on the high-silica material.

Mr Al-Khalil, who developed silicosis after five years of working with the stone, said he knows a growing number of engineered stone workers with the incurable illness, including a friend who has to use a mobility scooter as he can no longer walk.

Silicosis is an occupational disease that can destroy the lungs of workers who inhale particles of dust known as repairable crystalline silica (RCS) when cutting stone or rock without adequate safety measures in place.

The disease can cause scarring and inflammation of the lungs, severe breathing problems and increase the risk of lung infections and can ultimately be fatal if the lungs stop working properly or serious complications develop.

It has ravaged workers in sectors from mining to construction for decades, with an average of 12 UK deaths per year over the 10 years to 2021, although the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) says available sources are likely to substantially underestimate case numbers.

Aluminium dust explosion in dust collector - case study

“Shame on you!” roared the crowd outside the RCT council offices in Pontypridd. “Stop the quarry! Whose mountain? Our mountain!”

The blue stone at Craig yr Hesg is 70% quartz, ie silica. Which makes its chippings used for road building highly skid resistant.

Silica dust – proven to cause cancer – falls from the sky. Yet, the council says the high rates of asthma, COPD and cancer are anecdotal.

Greed

Kids in Glyncoch are breathing silica dust to make a nice road surface. What an indictment of capitalist greed and indifference!

The Labour council has allowed multinational Heidelberg to rip out the mountain for years. In 2014, it sold 27 acres for an extension for £4,000 – and mineral rights for £2.2 million. But when the Labour-led Senedd granted a further extension last year, people in Glyncoch organised to fight back.

Houses in Glyncoch shake like there’s an earthquake, every time a blast comes. They shake when the massive lorries pound by.

The blasts terrify the kids. The quarry is now only 164 metres from the school. In Germany – home of Heidelberg HQ – legally, the distance would be 1,000 metres.

The analysis confirms the USGS’s initial conclusion that the blast was caused by an accumulation of hot water and steam in underground conduits that had gotten clogged by a buildup of silica. It’s a similar process to what occurs in geysers like Old Faithful, but unlike geysers, there is no well-worn path for the steam and water to travel to the surface. Instead, the pressure built up until it was stronger than the rock above it. Then, kaboom!

While some people with lung diseases receive transplants, donor organs remain in short supply. As an alternative, medications and other treatments can be used to manage symptoms, but no cure is available for disorders such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and cystic fibrosis.

Meanwhile, bioengineers are exploring the production of lung tissue in the lab, either as a more accurate model to study human lungs or as a potential material to use in implants. One technique involves 3D printing structures that mimic human tissue, but designing a suitable bioink to support cell growth remains challenging. 

Hyaluronic acid—a natural polymer found in connective and other tissues—was added to increase the bioink's viscosity and enhance cell growth and adhesion to MuMA. After the ink was printed in test patterns including round and square grids, it was exposed to blue light to crosslink the MuMA molecules. The crosslink bonds stabilized the printed structure in the form of a porous gel that readily absorbed water to support cell survival.

This latest global call to action emphasises four critical areas of response: protecting the vulnerable, protecting workers, boosting resilience and limiting further warming to stave off an era of what Guterres has termed “global boiling”.

The most vulnerable people include the young, sick, elderly, those on low incomes who can’t find safety in a cool place, and pregnant women. These particular groups are even more vulnerable if they live in rapidly urbanising cities in countries where excruciating heat shocks are becoming more frequent, intense and long-lasting. Women tend to face bigger burdens from extreme heat – most agricultural workers in fields are female and in towns and cities women carry out of the most domestic work.

Workers also need better protection. An estimated 70% of the global workforce is exposed to extreme heat – that includes construction and agricultural workers, warehouse and distribution centres and office workers.

Highlights

•Causal links between hydrocarbon exploitation and ecological responses were studied.

•Chemical and ecological effects were limited to within 500 m of the structure.

•Elevated contamination leads to general defaunation but benefits opportunistic taxa.

•Food webs are degraded through loss of larger predators and dietary specialists.

•New evidence is provided for future monitoring practices to prioritize impact zones.

Oil and gas exploitation introduces toxic contaminants such as hydrocarbons and heavy metals to the surrounding sediment, resulting in deleterious impacts on marine benthic communities.

Contamination from oil and gas platforms caused declines in benthic food web complexity, community abundance, and biodiversity.

Fewer trophic interactions and increased connectance indicated that the community became dominated by generalists adapting to alternative resources, leading to simpler but more connected food webs in contaminated environments. Decreased mean body mass, shorter food chains, and the dominance of small detritivores such as Capitella capitata near to structures suggested a disproportionate loss of larger organisms from higher trophic levels. These patterns were associated with concentrations of hydrocarbons and heavy metals that exceed OSPAR's guideline thresholds of sediment toxicity.

The UVA researchers, led by Jie Sun, Ph.D., found that COVID-19 infection can cause sweeping changes in immune cells inside the lung tissues, promoting scarring and driving ongoing inflammation even after the initial infection has passed. This ongoing inflammation, they believe, drives the lasting respiratory symptoms, such as cough and difficulty breathing, associated with long COVID.

The new research from Sun and his colleagues indicates that doctors may be able to halt this chronic inflammation using a class of drugs, including baricitinib, that are already used to treat rheumatoid arthritis. The anti-inflammatory drugs previously received emergency authorization from the federal Food and Drug Administration to treat the uncontrolled inflammation seen in severe COVID-19 infections.

The UVA researchers looked at cell samples collected from the lower airways of both lab mice and human patients.

In both cases, they found that immune cells known as macrophages and T cells had gone haywire and were having faulty, harmful interactions. These cells normally help the body fight off the disease, but, in this case, they never stopped fighting, even after the initial COVID infection had passed.

The macrophages, the researchers found, had flooded into the lungs in abnormal numbers and were promoting tissue scarring. The T cells, meanwhile, were pumping out a substance called interferon that spurs continued inflammation.

Scientists from Northwestern Medicine and Brigham and Women's Hospital have noticed that lupus patients exhibit changes in multiple molecules in their blood. These changes, in turn, lead to a lack of activation of a pathway managed by the aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AHR). The AHR regulates the cells' response to environmental agents such as pollutants, bacteria, or metabolites. When the activation of AHR is lacking, T peripheral helper cells—or disease-promoting immune cells—become abundant and promote the production of disease-causing autoantibodies.

Through this discovery, Dr. Jaehyuk Choi and his team hypothesized that activating the AHR pathway with small molecule activators could reduce the number of disease-causing cells. Investigators tested this hypothesis by injecting these AHR small molecule activators into the blood samples of lupus patients. Doing so seemed to reprogram the lupus-causing cells into a cell type called Th22, which may help reverse the damage caused by the disease.

The evidence for acute effects of air pollution on mortality in India is scarce, despite the extreme concentrations of air pollution observed. This is the first multi-city study in India that examines the association between short-term exposure to PM2·5 and daily mortality using causal methods that highlight the importance of locally generated air pollution.

Interpretation

Short-term PM2·5 exposure was associated with a high risk of death in India, even at concentrations well below the current Indian PM2·5 standard. These associations were stronger for locally generated air pollutants quantified through causal modelling methods than conventional time-series analysis, further supporting a plausible causal link.

Highlights

•A comprehensive meta-analysis of glyphosate concentration patterns in rivers revealed new sources.

•European river concentration patterns cannot be explained by herbicide application.

•Seasonal concentration patterns resemble those of wastewater markers.

•Glyphosate enters European rivers dominantly via wastewater.

•Glyphosate may be a transformation product of European laundry additives.

Our large meta-analysis clearly shows that for more than a decade, municipal wastewater was a very important source of glyphosate. In addition, European river water data show rather high and constant base mass fluxes of glyphosate all over the year, not expected from herbicide application.

From our meta-analysis, we define criteria for a source of glyphosate, which was hidden so far.

AMPA is known to be a transformation product not only of glyphosate but also of aminopolyphosphonates used as antiscalants in many applications.

As they are used in laundry detergents in Europe but not in the USA, we hypothesize that glyphosate may also be a transformation product of aminopolyphosphonates.

Tick larvae feed on small rodents, from which they pick up disease, then they molt to the nymph stage, get another blood meal from another host, and molt to the adult stage. As adults, they mate, and then the female must have another blood meal [likely on a deer] before laying eggs.

A tick that bites a human at any one of these stages could pass on the bacteria, viruses, or parasites that cause the tick-related diseases, he explained.

That means it's not just the ticks that require study, but rather how they interact with other animals and the whole ecosystem around them.

You are invited to our Support Group!

We're really looking forward to having you join us and other members of the Edinburgh Support Group at The Marriott Hotel on Edinburgh Road at 2:30 pm on Saturday, August 17, 2024. We're lucky to have Rob Hunter from ERI sharing some of his latest research with us. After the presentation, we'll have sandwiches, tea, coffee, and a great chance to chat and learn from each other. Just a friendly reminder to take note of the venue and time for the event.

If you haven't already registered, please feel free to do so by pressing the Book Now button below, which will take you to our Eventbrite page.

Can't wait to see you there!

Kind Regards,

The Lauren Currie Twilight Foundation