Super-polluted city tries to clean itself with smog-eating paint

Manila is one of the world’s five dirtiest cities, but graffiti? That’s not a problem. It’s not that people don’t paint on the walls in the hyper-polluted Philippines capital, because they do. But they do it with a paint that actually eats smog out of the air. The catalytic paint, called Boysen KNOxOUT, reacts with light and water vapor to filter out nitrogen oxides. Manila is deploying the paint in the form of massive murals, which are both beautiful and, because of their size, effective.

Low-Cost Biosensor Detects Contaminated Water September 7, 2012 April Flowers for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online For children under five years old, diarrheal disease is the second largest cause of death. This disease kills as many as 1.5 million children globally every year according to the World Health Organization (WHO). These horrifying statistics led a group of undergraduate students from Arizona State University to develop a low cost biosensor — a simple device that would detect contaminated water. The device design comes as part of the 2012 International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition. The nine-member ASU team started prepping for the synthetic biology competition this summer. “We are developing a biosensor that will detect pathogenic bacteria, such as Shigella, Salmonella, and E. coli, that cause diarrhea,” said Ryan Muller, an undergraduate student in ASU´s School of Life Sciences and an iGEM team leader. The team is working on two biosensor designs.

Health | Nitrogen Dioxide Current scientific evidence links short-term NO2 exposures, ranging from 30 minutes to 24 hours, with adverse respiratory effects including airway inflammation in healthy people and increased respiratory symptoms in people with asthma. Also, studies show a connection between breathing elevated short-term NO2 concentrations, and increased visits to emergency departments and hospital admissions for respiratory issues, especially asthma. NO2 concentrations in vehicles and near roadways are appreciably higher than those measured at monitors in the current network. In fact, in-vehicle concentrations can be 2-3 times higher than measured at nearby area-wide monitors. Individuals who spend time on or near major roadways can experience short-term NO2 exposures considerably higher than measured by the current network. NO2 exposure concentrations near roadways are of particular concern for susceptible individuals, including people with asthma asthmatics, children, and the elderly

could also be one for Health and Wellbeing - I'll put it there too by hayleyshaw May 25

I am totally amazed by this. Could have a huge effect if every building was painted with the stuff. Are there any downfalls? Not enough of a chemist to know. by hayleyshaw May 25