All we have to do is look, and we find more “forever chemicals” all throughout the environment and our bodies. This just adds to my suspicion that classes of chemicals like PFAS and microplastics (and before that lead, DDT, etc.) might not be the most pervasive or dangerous chemicals out there, but merely the ones we have put under the magnifying glass so far. Similarly, we put the Covid-19 virus under many microscopes for many years and found all kinds of things it does to our bodies and brains. But if we put similar scrutiny on other microorganisms, who knows what we might find?

A new study shows that a specific type of silicone, the so-called methylsiloxanes, is widely present in the atmosphere across diverse environments. Also, concentrations appear to be much higher than expected. According to the researchers, this raises concerns about their potential—yet poorly understood—effects on human health and the climate. Methylsiloxanes are commonly used in industry, transportation, cosmetics, and household products. The study was supervised by Utrecht University and the University of Groningen, and the results are published in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics.

I’m probably a broken record on this, but chemistry really does make our modern lives safer and more convenient overall. Without water disinfection, food preservatives, antibiotics, vaccines, dental anesthesia, etc., our lives would be nasty, brutish, and short indeed, as they were before we had those things. We don’t want to give up the benefits of useful chemicals, but we also should always be searching for non-toxic alternatives that give us the same benefits.