Caribbean‑scale Sargassum invasions—tens of millions of tons a year—can be harvested and converted into products (e.g., biomaterials, fuels, fertilizers) rather than landfilled. Researchers are building processing pathways and supply chains, while grappling with contaminants and logistics. This reframes the seaweed surge from a cleanup expense into a potential raw‑materials stream.
— If viable, a waste‑to‑resource policy could mitigate tourism losses, create coastal jobs, and guide regulation on biomass quality and harvesting impacts.
Devin Reese
2025.12.02
52% relevant
Both stories reframe biological material streams as industrial feedstocks: the Sargassum idea turns nuisance seaweed into products, while the riflebird‑inspired work shows natural optics motifs can be translated into sustainable, lower‑toxicity materials for industry; both raise similar governance issues about sourcing, sustainability, and local economic effects.
Fiona Spooner
2025.12.01
55% relevant
Both pieces reframe massive biological flows as a consequence of human systems and as potential policy/economic targets: the 95% mammal‑biomass figure points to a similar opportunity/constraint logic as Sargassum (i.e., enormous, anthropogenic biomass streams that require governance, supply‑chain design, or valorization). The Our World in Data numbers make clear the scale at which agriculture and animal husbandry shape global biomass, which strengthens arguments for treating biological waste and resource flows as industrial policy problems.
Lisa S. Gardiner
2025.10.01
100% relevant
The article cites 24 million tons of Sargassum in 2022, a 9% tourism drop in 2011, and a network led by Loretta Roberson (MBL) with Rutgers and Princeton to develop Sargassum uses.