Budding blossom

Incoming 🚂

Crediting and citing Indigenous Knowledges within research Abstract. Knowledge exchanges between Indigenous and scientific communities occur regularly, with researchers frequently seeking and benefiting from Indige

Very happy to celebrate the publication of this important paper on crediting and citing Indigenous knowledges within the research.

A special thanks to @christine-barry.bsky.social, Uncle Bob Muir and @conservbytes.bsky.social for leading this initiative.

Real-Time Measurements of Gas-Phase Medium-Chain Chlorinated Paraffins Reveal Daily Changes in Gas-Particle Partitioning Controlled by Ambient Temperature Chlorinated paraffins (CPs) are synthetic polychlorinated n-alkanes produced as mixtures of a range of CxClyH2x–y+2 formulas. CPs have numerous industrial applications but are toxic, long-lived, and environmentally ubiquitous with environmental releases occurring throughout their production, use, and disposal. Short-chain chlorinated paraffins (SCCPs, C10–13) have been regulated by the United States Environmental Protection Agency since 2009 and by the Stockholm Convention since 2017. SCCP regulation is expected to cause increased production of medium-chain chlorinated paraffins (MCCPs; C14–17), which are currently under consideration for Stockholm Convention regulations. Thus, there is a need to improve the understanding of MCCP environmental transport, distribution, and fate. Existing measurements are limited in their spatial and temporal coverage. Measurements of CP atmospheric loading are particularly scarce. Historically, these measurements have required long sampling times, obscuring the temporal behavior of atmospheric CPs. We report real-time in situ measurements of 18 gas-phase MCCPs. These measurements were made in the United States Southern Great Plains with nitrate ion chemical ionization mass spectrometry (NO3–CIMS). The estimated average lower-limit concentration of MCCPs is on the order of single-digit ng/m3. MCCP diel behavior is partially explained by gas-particle partitioning with implications for MCCP transport and lifetimes.

Very cool new study reports real-time measurement of MCCPs in Oklahoma doi.org/10.1021/acse....

I think the day-night variability they see could be "nighttime depletion" under the nocturnal boundary layer, which we described for PCBs at Hazelrigg in this paper: pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.....

I'm are pleased to share our latest study examining an overlooked dimension of #microplastic exposure pathways. In this study, we provide the first international evidence that cigarette tobacco itself—independent of filters—contains microplastics at measurable levels.
doi.org/10.1016/j.en...

Wow. More than 17,300 downloads in 2 weeks since publication:

Global human population has surpassed Earth’s sustainable carrying capacity

iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1...

#overpopulation

Global glacier mass change in 2025 Nature Reviews Earth & Environment - Glaciers lost 408 ± 132 Gt of mass during the hydrological year 2025, equivalent to 1.1 ± 0.4 mm sea-level rise. Since 1975, glacier mass loss has...

New article about the global state of glaciers out: rdcu.be/fctdV
For Swedish glaciers, 2025 was a "good bad year": There was much less melt than compared to the record high mass losses in 2024, but the overall balance was still negative @stockholm-uni.bsky.social @bolincentre.bsky.social

I don't remember seeing an image of Earth before that captures the (thin, fragile, tiny layer of) atmosphere so clearly. I mean, look at that.

Only 16 km separates the La Paz-El Alto metropolis (1.8M people) from a Bolivian Andes peak.
Yet soils above 5000m show elevated pollution levels and distinct chemical fingerprints pointing to distant sources.

Is long-range transport dominating pollution at the summit?
pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...

Too many people? The greatest threat to our children and grandchildren is… more people.

Too many people?

cribb.substack.com/p/too-many-p...

Warmest march month @bolincentre.bsky.social @stockholm-uni.bsky.social #SMHI: www.svt.se/nyheter/loka...
We read out data from #TarfalaResearchStation s Automated Weather Station and confirm: It was the warmest march month here since 1965, with a monthly average of only -3.6 C this year

Retraction: Cosmetic talc powder On June 25, 1977, The Lancet published an unsigned commentary1 that discussed the possibility of asbestos in talcum powder causing cancer and other fatal diseases. It concluded: “there is no reason to...

I guess we can file this under "better late than never."
www.thelancet.com/journals/lan... @kaurov.org @rproctor.bsky.social

If all goes according to plan, in a few hours, a crew of astronauts will begin a journey that will take them on a loop around the moon. Here's a video that NASA put together to help people visualize the journey through space, first orbiting the earth before looping around the moon and flying home 🔭

This is my favorite climate change chart. Japanese monks, aristocrats, and emperors kept meticulous records of cherry blossom festivals for 1,200 years and accidentally built the world's longest climate dataset.

For a crash course in why chemical & material pollution on Mars is important, check out John's winning Science Slam talk from SETAC 2023...

vimeo.com/reviews/9b08...

Toward “Safe” Chemicals and Materials on Mars: Knowledge Gaps for Expanding Planetary Protection Requirements The United Nations Outer Space Treaty states that the exploration of celestial bodies must avoid “harmful contamination” which may impede scientific exploration by other parties to the treaty. To guid...

Check out our new paper in ES&T describing science & policy needs to achieve "no- or low-exposure by design" for chemicals & materials that are sent to Mars.

Led by John Hader, with @marleneagerstrand.bsky.social. #openaccess in @envirosci.acspublications.org.

doi.org/10.1021/acs....

Great to be part of the team contributing to this new book on #microplastics and #nanoplastics. I helped with two chapters alongside super co-authors @praetorius-a.bsky.social, @mattmacleod.bsky.social, @pradodomercq.bsky.social, Patrizia Schmidt and Wendel Wohlleben.

Proud to have written a chapter on micro- and nanoplastic environmental transport and fate modelling (chapter 9) in this new RSC book on Microplastic and Nanoplastics in the environment, together with @pradodomercq.bsky.social @samharrison.science and @mattmacleod.bsky.social

Ending the Iran War

In Trump's America, Iran threatens you: www.nytimes.com/2026/03/26/b...

photograph or a poster on cream colored paper. "Dear President Ambar, we are writing to you on a typewriter that is over 70 years old. This is a machine that we all know well. With it, we misspell words without the crutch of spell check or generative AI and we think intently about every phrase we pound out. As we force ourselves, for once, to slow down, we engage in a cognitive dialogue with ourselves. We do not seek perfection because we know that education is about the growing and challenging of our young minds' potential, not the chasing of institutional 'gold-star' approval. We do not believe that your so-called 'Year of AI Exploration; providing enterprise ChatGPT and Google Gemini subscriptions to every Oberlin student aligns with our college's founding principles. You claim that this year will be one of experimentation, not adoption. But even just one semester of accepted (encouraged even) chat bot use will jettison our student body down a lazy and irredeemable tunnel of intellectual destruction. We are a college grounded in learning and labor, which now risks straying from these rooted ideals. With ChatGPT at the helm, our emails, essays,and discussion posts will be generated for us, not by us. And let's not fool ourselves. This is precisely what these platforms will be used for by our busy, anxious student body. We see your vision for this year as.advancing the college's 'businessification'--an alarming trend also seen in the takeover of our beloved library cafe by a 'bookstore' with no books in stock and an app replacing customer service. In one instance, the college assumes we want efficiency at all costs through automated rather than hand pulled coffee. In the other lies the false belief that we simply desire to turn in an essay, regardless of how little we've written of it." there's more that doesn't fit in the 2000 character limit :(

OH MY HEART...the Oberlin Luddites Reject "The Year of AI Exploration"! 💚

Professor Ian Cousins at Stockholm University has together with international collaborators traced industrial #PFAS (forever chemicals) in snow across Antarctica, revealing how pollution travels across the globe before settling in one of Earth’s most remote environments.
www.su.se/english/divi...

The course discusses the different answers that practical philosophy has to offer to the question of what makes a human life good for the one who lives it. The course thus seeks answers to questions such as: What is happiness, and is happiness the only thing important to living a good life? What role, if any, does morality play in the good life? What role does excellence or success play? By considering philosophical theories about the good life, the course seeks to provide answers to questions such as these. The theories covered during the course are discussed and problematized, among other things by examining the implications they have for our individual life choices and the question of how we should live.

Our popular summer course Happiness and the Good Life is open for applications. The course is fully remote and taught in English. Deadline March 16. Sign up today! www.su.se/utbildning/u... CC: @stockholm-uni.bsky.social

The Electric Vehicle Tariff Boomerang If we want more EVs in the US, all we need to do is allow the world’s most popular EVs, which are made by Chinese brands, to compete directly in the US market. This is why I think a recent landmark…

Jim Sallee's EI blog today on how trump's misguided tariffs will bring inexpensive and impressive Chinese EV's to our neighbors. US auto policy only makes sense if climate change isn't real and EV tech progress will slow drastically. Pretty stupid bet.
energyathaas.wordpress.com/2026/03/02/t...

1/ I'm starting to see more and more parallels between MOOCs and AI.

MOOCs worked in computer science because the end result of problems are either right or wrong. But they really ONLY worked in CS. They didn't work in any other field because there was no way to make assessment work at scale.

Line chart titled: 'AI could end scarcity, end humanity - or boost trend growth by 0.2 percentage points' It depicts US real GDP per capita on a logarithmic vertical axis under three scenarios. In the first scenario, AI ends scarcity and real GDP per person increases 10x in a matter of years. In the second scenario, AI results in human extinction and real GDP shrinks to effectively zero in about a decade or so. In the third scenario, real GDP grows slightly faster than its current rate.

Fun chart from the FT. Come for the log scale, stay for the, um, wide range of scenarios being modelled.

'AI could end scarcity, end humanity - or boost trend growth by 0.2 percentage points'

🔗: www.ft.com/content/60df...

The annual call for the Tarfala Research Station MasterStudent Grant @stockholm-uni.bsky.social @bolincentre.bsky.social is now out, so please check this out and apply (no later than 27 february): www.su.se/english/divi...

Graphic showing changes in CO₂, global temperatures and global sea levels over the last 2025 years. Steep increases are visible after the industrial revolution.

Updated climate indicators graphics, now including 2025

ed-hawkins.github.io/climate-visu...

Canada 🇨🇦 cheating at curling was not on my bingo card 😳

Interrupting my regularly scheduled programming to announce the happy news that the Baltic Sea froze over, generating vast surfaces suitable for long-distance skating. My old friend Jens Liljestrand and I took some time off to explore the edge of the archipelago today, and it was glorious ❄️❄️❄️

How Canada and Sweden are redefining northern security and co-operation As global tensions rise, Canada and Sweden are shifting from defence procurement to long-term strategic alignment across security, industry and Arctic governance.

For many years, co-operation between Canada and Sweden was often viewed through a narrow lens — defence procurement. But there is a deeper shift under way. Article in @theconversation.com by Christophe Premat @premat.bsky.social professor in Canadian studies.
theconversation.com/how-canada-a...