Let's say you are a commercial manufacturer about to introduce a new consumer product to the market for the first time. Will this product, or its manufacturing process, contribute to global warming by increasing the greenhouse effect? Until now, there has been no real answer to this question.
Scientists report the development of a new method to scan fur and predict how certain substances, from chemicals used in carpet cleaning to electronic components, will contribute to global warming. The findings were published in the scientific journal Journal of Physical Chemistry.
In the new study, scientists Timothy Lee, Partha Bera and Joseph Francisco noted that carbon dioxide is still the main greenhouse gas, trapping heat near the Earth's surface much like the glass panes that make up greenhouses. However, other gases also have the same effect, and in fact are even more harmful than carbon dioxide. Scientists have already realized that gases, found in gases, differ in their ability to contribute to global warming. However, they know little about how and why this happens - that is, what is the molecular basis of these differences.
The scientists examined more than a dozen animals involved in global warming to find the chemical and physical characteristics that most influence the degree of their internal radiation efficiency, a measure directly related to their ability to harm the environment.
They found that compounds, which contain several fluorine atoms, tend to be stronger greenhouse gases, compared to compounds containing chlorine or hydrogen atoms. They found for the first time that the radiation efficiency of compounds containing several fluorine atoms, linked to the same carbon atom they share, increases in a non-linear manner.
"We hope that the findings of this study will be used in the design of more environmentally friendly materials," the researchers note.
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Public health was born as a response to our need to improve the quality of our lives by understanding the different types of food we consume. In an age of industrial food and supermarkets filled with plenty of prepared foods, we must know which products are essential for our bodies and which products may endanger our health