Okinawa - GoKawiil

Researchers find melted plastic fused into coral skeletons in Okinawa

A team studying beaches on Japan's Ryukyu Islands identified colorful fragments embedded in coral gravel that turned out to be plastic melted into the coral's microscopic pores. Using spectroscopy and micro-CT scans, they confirmed the plastic and coral skeleton had fused so thoroughly they could not be separated, and they named the material 'plasticoral.' The team believes beach bonfires burning discarded plastic waste near coral rubble likely caused the fusion.

wired.com · 2026-09-29

Fly-brain-inspired algorithm Spi-Fly aims to fix electronic noses' memory loss

Researchers Kevin Max and Yang Shen at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology have developed an algorithm called Spi-Fly that mimics how fruit fly brains process and remember smells. Published in Neuromorphic Computing and Engineering, the work targets a key weakness of existing electronic noses: their tendency to forget previously learned odors when trained on new ones.

arstechnica.com · 2026-09-03