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Thousands of researchers will descend on Boston this fall for an event billed as the world's largest gathering of synthetic biologists. The field is evolving so rapidly that even scientists working in it don't agree on a definition, but at its core synthetic biology involves bringing engineering principles to biotechnology.

General Mills and Nestlé pledged to not use synthetic vanilla flavoring in their jointly owned Häagen-Dazs products. Proponents of synthetic vanilla argue that it could reduce land impacts associated with vanilla bean production, while opponents maintain that the product could reduce biodiversity by incentivizing new sugarcane production.

CertiChem and its founder, George Bittner, who is also a professor of neurobiology at the University of Texas-Austin, had recently coauthored a paper in the NIH journal Environmental Health Perspectives. It reported that "almost all" commercially available plastics that were tested leached synthetic estrogens-even when they weren't exposed to conditions known to unlock potentially harmful chemicals, such as the heat of a microwave, the steam of a dishwasher, or the sun's ultraviolet rays. According to Bittner's research, some BPA-free products actually released synthetic estrogens that were more potent than BPA.

Machine washing of clothes is a major contributor to plastic pollution in the oceans. Every time we do laundry, garments made from synthetic fabrics such as fleece and polyester shed small plastic fibers that end up in the water and pollute rivers and oceans. So denim giant G-Star and marine pollution campaign group the Plastic Soup Foundation are joining forces to stop this process in its tracks with a battle against microfiber.

Plastic Soup Foundation (PSF), a Dutch nonprofit, and New York-based Parley for the Oceans announced Tuesday a partnership to tackle the issue of microfiber pollution and to create a global alliance of companies, governments, NGOs and scientists. Microfibers - tiny, often synthetic threads shed from laundry, industrial clothing manufacturing and fishing nets - have been found in alarming numbers in recent studies of microplastic pollution.

Finally, the fashion industry realizes we cannot continue this trend in a world where the rising population will have to devote more land to food - or even energy. We cannot continue to grow cotton like mad, nor can we endlessly spin fossil fuels into polyester or other synthetic fabrics. The road toward more sustainable fibers will be a long one with plenty of failures and misses, but it is one we need to take. That is, at least, absent a total rethink of how many clothes we really need in our closets - a discussion the large global clothing chains want to avoid.

James Cook University researchers are teaming with Australia's Fibercon company to create a greener concrete by using recycled plastic to reinforce it. "Using plastic to reinforce concrete instead of steel can reduce carbon dioxide production by about 50%," said Rabin Tuladhar, associate dean of engineering at the institution. "However, with recycled plastic, you can save 50% more carbon dioxide than you could with virgin plastic -- because you are using plastic that has already been made and repurposing it."

For thousands of years humans have existed on Earth, but it is only in the last 100 or so that plastics have entered our lives. These days you can barely go a minute without touching something made from some kind of plastic. But while we've been getting all swept up in the convenience that synthetic polymers bring us, the trash has been piling up. Millions of metric tons of plastic enter the ocean every year, and no one really knows where it is and what damage it is causing. So ... what are we to do about it?

The Silk Leaf, by RCA graduate Julian Melchiorri, is the first manmade material that can perform photosynthesis. It has huge implications for science and technology and it could also make long-distance space travel a possibility.