Nearly 100 North Carolina child care centers that use public water supplies are partnering with RTI International to test for lead. Additional child care centers and elementary schools can enroll in the study through mid-August. Participation in the study is free and participant results are private.
Chester County is the wealthiest county among all 67 counties in Pennsylvania. The median household yearly income is more than $85,000. And yet, more than 25,000 county residents received over $3 million in SNAP (food stamp) benefits because they do not have enough money to consistently put food – let alone healthy food – on the table each night. Last year, Chester County Hospital sought to tackle the issue by providing a "food insecurity" questionnaire to patients in the hospital's Ob/Gyn clinic. As a result of the Food Insecurity study, the Chester County Food Bank now pre-packages emergency food kits for the Ob/Gyn Clinic to have instantly available for their patients who acknowledge that they worry when their families will eat next. The boxes are nutritious and geared toward prenatal women. There are discussions currently underway to expand the screening tool hospital-wide.
Our economy, livelihood and wellbeing depend on food and its supply chains. Supply chains may break if a natural disaster destroys a crop in its primary production region, or if someone tampers with food to cause harm or raise profits. In such cases we need to find out quickly about these incidents and find alternative sources of food ingredients and supplies.
Given Pennsylvania’s abundant natural resources, it’s no surprise that the commonwealth has become a mecca for hydraulic fracturing. Researchers, however, have recently discovered that releasing millions of gallons of treated hydraulic fracturing wastewater each year into area surface waters may have longer-lasting effects than originally thought.
Working with Parker Hannifin, Sandia National Laboratories combined basic research on an interesting form of carbon with a unique microsensor to make an easy-to-use, table-top tool that quickly and cheaply detects disinfection byproducts in our drinking water before it reaches consumers.
Researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania have found evidence that the most difficult C. difficile cases, known as multiple recurring C. difficile infections (mrCDI), are rapidly becoming more common.
Despite popular conceptions as an offshoot of the environmental movement, much of the field of ecology evolved to meet the needs of the federal government during the Atomic Age. The Department of Energy’s national laboratories played a key role, from developing fundamental theories to computer models. The contributions from the institutions that became Savannah River Ecology Laboratory, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory still influence the field today.
Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have shown that four strains of E. coli bacteria working together can convert sugar into the natural red anthocyanin pigment found in strawberries, opening the door to economical natural colors for food and cosmetic manufacturers.
An international team of researchers, including the University of Portsmouth, has called for stronger government intervention in China to implement food safety rules, regulations and support.
Researchers use equations and on-the-ground analyses to the follow water held in the soil versus fresh rainfalls. This can improve water management in drought- and flood-affected areas.
Kansas State University researchers published a study in Frontiers in Environmental Science that showed Manganese relates differently than its cancer-causing cousin, arsenic, to dissolved organic matter in groundwater. Researchers say more studies are need to understand the relationship.
Did you know you throw out about 20 pounds of food every month? Nearly 40 percent of the food produced in the U.S. goes to waste. Iowa State University experts have tips for reducing waste at home, and look at how the food service industry is working to do the same.
After several people in New York City were diagnosed with Legionnaire’s disease in less than two weeks, an expert at New York Institute of Technology College of Osteopathic Medicine (NYITCOM) urges people to take caution.
New research shows E. coli may not be the best indicator of recent fecal pollution because it can survive and proliferate in beach sand. Using it as a warning sign to close beaches may result in more closings than are actually needed.
Rain or shine has new meaning thanks to an innovative, inexpensive and simple tactic developed by researchers at FAU that will really change how people think about watering their lawns. The tactic? A straightforward road sign.
Determining E. coli levels in sediments and its ability to attach to sand and silt and float downstream will help scientists figure out what needs to be done to decrease bacterial levels in streams.
The Institute for Global Food Security at Queen’s University Belfast will lead one of the world’s largest food safety projects across Europe and China.
Human interventions to harness water resources, such as reservoirs, dams, and irrigation measures, have increased water availability for much of the global population, but at the same time, swept water scarcity problems downstream.
Chemical reactions that make improvements in water purification and batteries possible occur at scales too small to see. A team including a UD researcher has developed a way to produce real-time observations documenting the reactions that happen between liquids and solids.
A Northwestern University-led research team has discovered an inexpensive and renewable material that rapidly removes PFOA, a highly toxic pollutant, from water. The treatment effectively eliminates the micropollutant, which has plagued several U.S. communities' water supplies last year.
While climate change is expected to lead to more violence related to food scarcity, new research suggests that the strength of a country’s government plays a vital role in preventing uprisings.
The researchers discovered that routing runoff contaminated with road salts to stormwater ponds actually resulted in plumes of highly contaminated groundwater moving from the ponds to streams.
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- New Indiana University research shows many Americans don't know how clean water gets to their homes and especially what happens after wastewater is flushed away, knowledge that is vital in confronting challenges including droughts and failing infrastructure that can lead to contamination.
There is nothing better on a hot summer day than a refreshing dip in a pool, stream, lake or ocean.
However, bacteria and parasites can lurk in all kinds of water and put a real damper on summertime fun unless people practice a few, simple measures.
New research from the University of Cincinnati (UC) reveals that residents of the Mid-Ohio River Valley had higher than normal levels of perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) based on blood samples collected over a 22-year span. The exposure source was likely from drinking water contaminated by industrial discharges upriver.
This is the first study of PFOA serum concentrations in U.S. residents in the 1990s.
Prof. Boris Rybtchinski has created membranes comprised mostly of water, that self-assemble in water. They can filter out particles based on size, and can be easily disassembled. Crafting nanomaterials that are also sustainable is a major goal of Prof. Rybtchinski’s lab.
According to the latest national assessment, 85 percent of the people in Bangladesh have access to safe drinking water. However, a multi-year, interdisciplinary study of water use in one of the country’s rural areas conducted by a team of Vanderbilt University researchers has uncovered two major problems not reflected in the national statistics.
The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee’s School of Freshwater Sciences has appointed Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter Dan Egan as the Brico Fund Senior Water Policy Fellow in Great Lakes Journalism. In this role, Egan will investigate, write and disseminate in-depth news stories about the most pressing issues facing the Great Lakes.
An interdisciplinary group of experts will explore the wide-reaching ramifications of water scarcity in the Middle East as well as potential social, political and technological solutions to this critical issue at a public daylong symposium May 24 at Northwestern University.
The Partnership for Food Safety Education is using research from Kansas State University's Center for Sensory Analysis and Consumer Behavior for its nationwide campaign promoting food safety and safe poultry handling.
By understanding how they respond to toxic elements, scientists can look at how environmental changes caused by agriculture and road runoff or warming temperatures and climate change could impact populations in lakes, rivers and standing bodies of water.
Researchers from Queen’s University Belfast have found that almost half of baby rice food products contain illegal levels of inorganic arsenic despite new regulations set by the EU.
Engineers at the University of Maryland have developed a new use for wood: to filter water. Liangbing Hu of the Energy Research Center and his colleagues added nanoparticles to wood, then used it to filter toxic dyes from water.
Water-splitting systems require a very efficient catalyst to speed up the chemical reaction that splits water into hydrogen and oxygen, while preventing the gases from recombining back into water. Now an international research team, including scientists at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, has developed a new catalyst with a molybdenum coating that prevents this problematic back reaction and works well in realistic operating conditions.
Contaminated food puts humans at risk of serious illness worldwide. With that in mind, UF/IFAS researchers wanted to know how people get their information about food safety and what sources they trust.
Scientists at the George Washington University used a powerful genetic technique to test seafood dinners sold in six District restaurants and found 33 percent had been mislabeled.