In the 1990s, Chinese markets saw that discarded plastic could be profitably recreated into exportable bits and bobs—and it was less expensive for international cities to send their waste to China than to deal with it themselves.

The European Union was the top exporter, followed by North America and Japan.

To help stop global warming, cancel that round-the-world holiday. Tourism has expanded so rapidly that it now accounts for 8 per cent of the greenhouse gases we belch into the air. That is up to four times previous estimates.

The team’s new estimates are higher because, as well as direct emissions from air transit, they also included indirect emissions. These include emissions from food production for tourists eating lavishly while on holiday, hotel upkeep and maintenance, and souvenirs. In 2013 this added an extra 1 to 2 gigatonnes.

The 34-year-old was rushed to an emergency room in New York after developing "excruciating" pain from eating the Carolina Reaper, according to a report in the British Medical Journal this week.

According to Paul Bosland, professor of horticulture at New Mexico State University and director of the Chile Pepper Institute, has said the grub can theoretically cause death, but in most cases people's bodies "would react sooner and not allow it to happen".

Dragon's Breath was created by a farmer for the Chelsea Flower show and is so potent that it had to be kept in a sealed container when it went on display.

Scientists have established that the whole structure on the Italian island of Sicily is edging in the direction of the Mediterranean at a rate of 14mm per year.

This instrumentation is sensitive to millimetric changes in the shape of the volcanic cone; and with 11 years of data it is now obvious, he says, that the mountain is moving in an east-south-east direction, on a general track towards the coastal town of Giarre, which is about 15km away.

It is hard to study these mystery microbes because most can’t be grown in labs. They need the conditions of their natural habitat – be it a hydrothermal vent or our intestines – to survive.

Metagenomics has already made big finds. In September, Philip Hugenholtz and his team at the University of Queensland, Australia, used it to identify 1749 novel microbial species. But that was just the tip of the iceberg.

Just like humans, plants can succumb to the effects of general anesthetic drugs, researchers report this week in the Annals of Botany. The finding is striking for a variety of reasons—there’s the pesky fact that plants lack a central nervous system, for one thing.

The anesthetics temporarily caused the plants to go still and unresponsive. The Venus flytrap's spikey trap didn’t slam shut when poked. The shy plant was no longer shy; it’s leaves stayed open when gently brushed. Similarly, the sundew plants didn’t bend to capture dead fruit flies and the pea plant’s tendrils drooped and curled up instead of whirling in normal upward fashion.

EU countries have voted to renew the licence of glyphosate, a widely used weedkiller at the centre of environmental concerns.

The UK was among the states in favour of glyphosate renewal. Germany and Poland were also among them - though they had previously abstained.

Critics say widespread use of glyphosate reduces biodiversity, by killing plants that are essential for many insects and other animals.

Filling clouds with salt will brighten them and, in turn, reflect the sun's heat away from the sea below, Harrison says. Climate change has caused Australia's ocean temperatures to rise around 0.68 degree Celsius over the last century. That may not sound like much, but it's enough to cause a coral catastrophe. Harrison says his plan can offset this change and give the reef much-needed time to heal.

Current efforts amount to little more than stopgaps. Still, they're hoping they can alter the environment just enough to give Mother Nature a helping hand in repairing herself.

Research at more than 60 protected areas in Germany suggests flying insects have declined by more than 75% over almost 30 years.

They stressed the importance of adopting measures known to be beneficial for insects, including strips of flowers around farmland and minimising the effects of intensive agriculture.

Dr Lynn Dicks, from the University of East Anglia, UK, who is not connected with the study, said the paper provides new evidence for "an alarming decline" that many entomologists have suspected for some time.

A trove of documents was released by LA-based plaintiff firm Baum, Hedlund, Aristei & Goldman earlier in August. The company is representing people who claimed that they or their relatives got cancer due to Monsanto products.

“This is a look behind the curtain,” attorney Brent Wisner said. “This show[s] that Monsanto has deliberately been stopping studies that look bad for them, ghostwriting literature and engaging in a whole host of corporate malfeasance.

“They [Monsanto] have been telling everybody that these products are safe because regulators have said they are safe, but it turns out that Monsanto has been in bed with US regulators while misleading European regulators,” he added.