This Styrofoam-like packaging is made of popcorn—not plastic

Good News Notes: “Those bits that come inside your packages are called peanuts, but of course they are made from polystyrene, not anything natural. But what if we could send things packaged in popcorn—the actual food, not another plastic-derived counterpart—instead? That’s the hope of researchers at the University of Göttingen in Germany, who have developed the plant-based…

These microscopic robots swim through the ocean and dissolve microplastics

Good News Notes: “Microplastics—tiny pieces of plastic smaller than five millimeters across—are everywhere, from snow in the Arctic and rain in the Rocky Mountains to bottled water and beer. On the ocean floor, there may be nearly 16 million metric tons of it. In the top 200 meters of the Atlantic Ocean, there may be 21 million more metric…