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Articles on Plastic

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Gird your loins. Shutterstock

Are plastics making men infertile?

Recent research into the health effects of the plastic-making chemicals phthalates has reignited concerns about low sperm counts. But the evidence is far from conclusive.
In most states, the issue of container deposit legislation has festered for decades. Brian Finestone/Shutterstock.com

Spin the bottle: the fraught politics of container deposit schemes

Four decades after South Australia’s container deposit scheme began, New South Wales has finally overcome industry resistance and launched its own. Could the rest of the country now follow suit?
Inside Boeing’s Dreamliner: tomorrow’s polymers today. Jordan Tan

Five synthetic materials with the power to change the world

The New York World’s Fair of 1939-40 was one of the greatest expos the world had ever seen. Visitors to Flushing Meadow Park in Queens were invited to see the “world of tomorrow” giving them a first glimpse…
Rubbish strewn on beaches eventually ends up in one of the world’s giant ocean garbage patches. Vberger/Wikimedia Commons

Redrawing the map could reveal ocean garbage patch culprits

Most of us have littered at one time or another, and in the process we probably contributed to the enormous of amounts of plastic that enter the ocean every year, eventually ending up in one of the five…
Plastic bags are still hanging around years later. Adrian S Pye

Government’s plastic bag plan has been shot full of holes

After months of deliberation and consultations, the UK government’s long-awaited announcement about a plastic bag charge arrives, only for Defra to shoot it full of holes by opting to exempt retailers…
Diatoms (green) and bacteria (pink) living on ocean plastic. This is a false colour SEM image of part of the surface of a 5mm long plastic (yellow) from waters off eastern Tasmania, Australia. Julia Reisser and Jeremy Shaw

Creatures living on tiny ocean plastic may be cleaning our seas

We know that Australia’s waters contain lots of tiny pieces of plastic, and that these pieces can harm many marine species. But in new research published today we show that these microplastics are also…
Electronic thermoset components, such as those found in mobile phones, are destined for landfill – but new research points to a way to make them recyclable. David Goehring/Flickr

Recycling the ‘unrecyclable’: a new class of thermoset plastics

Plastics comprise around 10% of solid waste in Australia. And while we can recycle certain types, there is a group of particularly stable plastics called thermosets, common in electronic devices, which…

New type of plastic performs DIY repair

American researchers have created a plastic that can repair itself. Until recently, only living organisms could regenerate…
Debris or not debris? Floating rubbish could hamper the search for MH370. AAP Image/AP Pool, Kim Christian

The difficulty of searching for MH370 in a giant rubbish patch

Frustratingly, the search for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 has turned up many floating objects, but none of them are from the plane. That’s largely because the latest search area is likely to…

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