About Us
Founded in 1944, the American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science develops philanthropic support for the Weizmann Institute in Israel, and advances its mission of science for the future of humanity.
Dec 09, 2020... REHOVOT, ISRAEL—December 9, 2020—The mass of all human-produced materials – concrete, steel, plastics, asphalt, etc. – has now grown to equal the mass of all life on the planet, its biomass. According to a new study from the Weizmann Institute of Science, we are exactly at the crossover point, and humans are currently adding buildings, roads, vehicles, and products at a rate that is doubling every 20 years, leading to a “concrete jungle” that is predicted to reach over 2 teratonnes (2 million million) – or more than double the mass of living things – by 2040.
Dec 09, 2020...
In a startling sign of the impact that humans are having on our planet, a study published Dec. 9 estimates that 2020 marks the point when human-made materials outweigh the total mass of Earth’s living biomass.
Scientists at Israel’s Weizmann Institute of Science found that the total mass of human-made materials—such as concrete, steel and asphalt—has increased rapidly since 1900, when it made up the equivalent of just 3% of the mass of living biomass—plants, animals and microorganisms. As humans have constructed more buildings, roads, structures and objects over the last 120 years, the mass of human-produced materials has grown from less than 0.1 teratonnes to roughly 1 teratonne (1 trillion tonnes), the study, published in the journal Nature estimates.
Dec 09, 2020...
From roads and buildings to cars and plastic, human civilization is built on lots of stuff.
But roughly how much stuff have we actually created? And in the process, how much of the natural world have we consumed or destroyed?
A new analysis finds that on both counts, it's a lot ... so much, in fact, that these materials may now outweigh all of the living things left on Earth.
The year 2020 could be the year when human-made mass surpasses the overall weight of biomass - estimated to be roughly 1,100,000,000,000 tons, or 1.1 teratons - a milestone scientists say speaks to the enormous impact that humans have had on the planet.
https://weizmann-usa.org/news-media/news-releases/plastic-is-blowing-in-the-wind/
Dec 23, 2020... REHOVOT, ISRAEL—December 23, 2020—As the plastics in our oceans break up into smaller and smaller bits without breaking down chemically, the resulting microplastics are becoming a serious ecological problem. A new study by the Weizmann Institute of Science, published in Nature Communications, reveals another troubling aspect of microplastics (defined as particles smaller than 5 mm across): they are swept up into the atmosphere and carried on the wind to far-flung parts of the ocean, including those that appear to be plastic-free. Analysis reveals that such minuscule fragments can stay airborne for hours or days, spreading the potential to harm the marine environment and, by climbing up the food chain, to affect human health.
Jan 13, 2021...
When the volcano on the Mediterranean island of Santorini erupted over three thousand years ago – give or take a few hundred – it spewed lava, rocks and ash over a huge region. The ash from that eruption is so prevalent in the archaeological record that it is used to date the strata above and below.
But few agree on the chronological date of the eruption itself. That is why a single olive branch discovered in the ashes on Santorini has become the center of a recent controversy between archaeologists and chronologists.
https://weizmann-usa.org/news-media/news-releases/how-bushfire-smoke-traveled-around-the-world/
Mar 18, 2021... REHOVOT, ISRAEL—March 18, 2021—It’s not just how hot the fires burn – it’s also where they burn that matters. During the recent extreme fire season in Australia, which began in 2019 and burned into 2020, millions of tons of smoke particles were released into the atmosphere. Most of those particles followed a typical pattern and settled to the ground after a day or week; however, the particles created in fires burning in one area of the country managed to blanket the entire Southern Hemisphere for months. When studying particle-laden haze, two researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science noticed puzzling spikes in a certain measurement, and tracked the elevated levels to the fires in that area. Next, as reported in Science, the Israeli scientists uncovered the “perfect storm” of circumstances that swept the particles emitted from those fires into the upper atmosphere and spread them over the entire Southern Hemisphere.
Mar 18, 2021...
The 2019–20 wildfires in Australia injected huge amounts of smoke into the stratosphere, which has led to record aerosol levels over the southern hemisphere.
Ilan Koren at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel and Eitan Hirsch at the Israel Institute for Biological Research analysed satellite data collected between 1981 and 2020 to look at what effect the devastating bushfire season in Australia had on aerosol concentrations in the stratosphere.
Apr 16, 2021...
While Earth Day is 51 years old this year, the Earth is 4.54 billion years old – “plus or minus about 50 million years,” says the National Geographic Society. And yet in less than 200 years, the blink of an eye, humankind has thrown a wrench into our small planet’s carefully tuned systems.
Since the Industrial Age, our remarkable advances have had a flip side: chemicals, pharmaceuticals, fossil fuels, and the like have fouled our water, land, and climate. We have increased Earth’s temperature, causing mass extinctions, stronger storms, devastating wildfires, flooding, and food shortages – consequences that will only increase. And while we can all take personal steps, there is ultimately one hope for mitigating human impacts on the planet: science.
https://weizmann-usa.org/blog/finding-hope-in-and-for-coral/
May 11, 2021...
In late 2020, a team of marine scientists investigating Australia’s Great Barrier Reef came across a remarkable sight: a “detached coral feature that rises from the seabed to a height of nearly one-third of a mile,” reported The New York Times. It is “the first large new element of Australia’s famous reef system to be identified in more than 120 years.”
Coral is, in many ways, our environmental canary in a coal mine. Sensitive to changes in acidity, temperature, currents, and the like, these animals are early warning systems of climate change and its damage. Until the new finding, it felt like news about coral ranged from “depressing” to “even more depressing.” For example, in spring 2020, scientists reported that over half of the Great Barrier Reef’s corals had died since 1995, largely due to climate change-induced mass bleaching.
Jun 22, 2021... A team of researchers from the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Plant Physiology, the University of Naples Federico II, the Weizmann Institute of Science and the Porter School of the Environment and Earth Sciences has found that making food from air would be far more efficient than growing crops. In their paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the group describes their analysis and comparison of the efficiency of growing crops (soybeans) and using a food-from-air technique.
©2023 American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science
