+
Sign up for
The Upworthiest
Our top stories of the day delivered straight to your inbox.
Heroes

Worms that can eat plastic could save us from destroying the planet.

environmental clean up, styrofoam waste, biodegradable, science
Image created from Burst.

A small attempt to make an unpleasant situation more edible.

You tell me what's more repulsive: A Styrofoam cup laying on the ground or a pile of slimy, pulsing mealworms?

Wait! Before you answer, what if it was more than just one piece of Styrofoam — like 33 million tons of it?

And what if it wasn't just cups, but Styrofoam packaging, water bottles, and all different kinds of discarded plastic?


And what if it wasn't strewn across the grass, but instead dumped into one massive trench? Or worse, what if a bunch of it was just floating in the ocean, waiting to be swallowed up by some helpless sea creature?


When you put it like that, the answer seems pretty obvious.

But here's something new and surprising: Those wiggly little mealworms might just be the key to fighting plastic pollution all over the world.

Time for us to fess up: We, as a species, are not very good at recycling.

In the United States alone, every year we throw away about 33 million tons of plastic waste (including Styrofoam, which is basically fluffy plastic), with less than 10% of it being recycled properly.

Now, it's not all our fault. Modern recycling techniques have come a long way, but they aren't perfect. According to Popular Mechanics, materials like the ones used to make soda bottles can only be recycled (or "downcycled" into lesser products) so many times.

That means, one way or another, most of it will end up in a landfill eventually, where it could take centuries to biodegrade.

But it looks like we might be onto an amazing, if slightly unappetizing, solution.

Researchers just discovered that mealworms can eat nothing but Styrofoam, turn it into biodegradable worm poo, and get all the nutrition they need.

This is huge.

A collaborative study between Stanford University and Chinese researchers found that 100 of these mealworms, which are essentially baby beetles, could consume almost 40 milligrams of Styrofoam per day. Now, that's not a lot (it takes 453,592 milligrams to equal one pound), but the implications are much, much larger.

There are plenty of bugs out there that eat plastic, but this is the first time researchers have confirmed that what comes out the, er, other end is, in fact, totally natural. And even better? Eating the stuff doesn't harm the worms in the least.

In other words, something magical is going on inside these mealworms that lets them turn hazardous plastic into harmless organic waste.

Studying the chemical environment inside the mealworms' gut that makes this possible might lead to better recycling techniques.

When I first read about this, I imagined government officials unleashing hoards of mealworms on our landfills for an epic buffet, but unfortunately, that doesn't seem super plausible — remember, they eat really, really slowly.

But what if we could emulate the mechanisms inside their stomachs that break down the plastic? If we could just recreate that environment on a larger scale, we wouldn't have to work so hard melting down bottles and turning them back into new bottles.

We could just transform them into the equivalent of worm poo, which the researchers say can be used as soil and is totally safe for the Earth.

But you know what? None of this will matter if we don't get better at sorting our trash and recycling the things that ought to be recycled.

I never thought I'd say this, but if we work together with the mealworms, we really can make a difference.



Joy

Airbnb host wakes his guest up in the middle of the night so she wouldn't miss the northern lights

Best. Host. Ever.

@penslucero/TikTok

Pency Lucero taking in the Northern Lights

Seeing the northern lights is a common bucket list adventure for many people. After all, it ticks a lot of boxes—being a dazzling light show, rich historical experience and scientific phenomenon all rolled into one. Plus there’s the uncertainty of it all, never quite knowing if you’ll witness a vivid streak of otherworldly colors dance across the sky…or simply see an oddly colored cloud. It’s nature’s slot machine, if you will.

Traveler and content creator Pency Lucero was willing to take that gamble. After thorough research, she stumbled upon an Airbnb in Rörbäck, Sweden with an actual picture of the northern lights shining above the cabin in the listing. With that kind of photo evidence, she felt good about her odds.

However, as soon as she landed, snow began falling so hard that the entire sky was “barely visible,” she told Upworthy. Martin, the Airbnb host, was nonetheless determined to do everything he could to ensure his guests got to see the spectacle, even offering to wake Lucero up in the middle of the night if he saw anything.

Then one night, the knock came.

Keep ReadingShow less
nature
Pop Culture

People are loving this Amazon delivery driver for warning a woman that her house is 'unsafe'

Great info, even better delivery.

TikTok

Delivering packages AND safety.

Amazon delivery drivers don’t have the easiest job in the world. Sitting through traffic, working in extreme temperatures, hauling boxes … not exactly a fun time. So when a driver goes out of their way to be extra considerate—people notice.

One delivery driver has gone viral for the way she delivered a little bit of safety education, along with some lighthearted advice. The TikTok video of the encounter, which now has more than 4 million views, was shared by Jessica Huseman, who had only recently moved into her new house.

Keep ReadingShow less
acts of kindness
Pop Culture

Christopher Walken dancing in over 50 movies all perfectly spliced into a single music video

Most people don’t know he studied dance as a child.

via YouTube

These days, we could all use something to smile about, and few things do a better job at it than watching actor Christopher Walken dance.

A few years back, some genius at HuffPo Entertainment put together a clip featuring Walken dancing in 50 of his films, and it was taken down. But it re-emerged in 2014 and the world has been a better place for it.

Keep ReadingShow less
dance
Joy

A major UCLA study says that at least 65 species of animals laugh

If you've never seen a fox giggle, you're in for a treat.

SaveAFox/YouTube

Foxes giggle like children on helium.

Laughter is one of the most natural impulses in humans. Most babies start to laugh out loud at around 3 to 4 months, far earlier than they are able to speak or walk. Expressing enjoyment or delight comes naturally to us, but we're not the only creatures who communicate with giggles.

Researchers at UCLA have identified 65 species of animals who make "play vocalizations," or what we would consider laughter. Some of those vocalizations were already well documented—we've known for a while that apes and rats laugh—but others may come as a surprise. Along with a long list of primate species, domestic cows and dogs, foxes, seals, mongooses and three bird species are prone to laughter as well. (Many bird species can mimic human laughter, but that's not the same as making their own play vocalizations.)

Primatologist and UCLA anthropology graduate student Sasha Winkler and UCLA professor of communication Greg Bryant shared their findings in an article in the journal Bioacoustics.

Keep ReadingShow less
animals
Joy

People are sharing the weirdest, most unforgettable art they've found in thrift stores

As the old saying goes, one person's trash is another one's treasure.

via Thrift Store Art and Thrift Store Art

A few of the rare finds at Thrift Store Art's Instagram page

As the old saying goes, one person's trash is another one's treasure.

Even though people can easily buy used items on eBay, the thrift store business thrives in America, bringing in an estimated $10 billion annually. At a time when the economy is shaky, thrift stores are a recession-proof business. When times are tough, people love to find a deal, and there's never any end to the fashionistas who roam thrift stores looking for a rare find.

San Francisco surfer and self-proclaimed thrift store junkie Bryan Dickerson has turned his passion for rare treasures into an Instagram page with over 246,000 followers. Thrift Store Art showcases the most bizarre things that thrifters find in stores and leans heavily into strange-looking works of art and clothing with questionable sayings. His crowds of followers send him countless strange finds every day, and he rewards them by calling them rude names in the comments.

But for Dickerson, it's all in fun.

He told Bored Panda that the idea of Thrift Store Art is “not to bash art but to expand what can be considered as art—clothing, album art, book graphics, vacation souvenirs.” Dickerson's foray into thrift store content was a much-needed break from his job as the editor of a news website.

Keep ReadingShow less
art
Pop Culture

Guy shares the reason viral gym videos need to end, and it's so spot on

"If you can’t respect other people in a shared space, you don’t belong filming at all.”

Reddit

“This sense of entitlement has gotten out of hand."

Gyms are communal spaces where people can come to improve their health, fitness and/or overall well-being.

However, it’s no secret that many gyms have also become a production studio of sorts where influencers can set up a tripod to demonstrate the most cutting-edge squatting technique or where the average Joe can take that obligatory gym selfie to prove that the workout did, in fact, happen.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with either of these activities. However, they have sparked a new kind of behavior in gymgoers where they feign extreme frustration if folks walk from one machine to the next or grab a piece of equipment and, heaven forbid, enter the frame.

Keep ReadingShow less
community
Trending Stories