Orange Peels Can Save Babies

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Some of the oldest holiday traditions include oranges.

They are a symbol of warmth, prosperity and life’s sweetness all over the world. Now, oranges are also a symbol of hope.

Justin Chalkner, a researcher at Flinders University in Australia, hit upon a compound – found in orange peels – that “literally sucks mercury out of water and soil”.

Consider the amount of mercury pollution in the world’s oceans … this compound could be a saving grace.

The nontoxic polymer, made of a combination of sulfur and limonene, turns from dark red to a bright yellow when it absorbs mercury, which means it is both a mercury sensor and removal tool.

The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that 5,000 to 8,000 metric tons of mercury are emitted into the atmosphere each year. When mercury pollution affects every level of the food chain – the top (humans) being most at risk from its toxic side effects – each ton is detrimental to our way of life.

The research team is actively testing the new compound, called sulfur-limonene polysulfide, and are finding it can remove more than 50 percent of the mercury in a water sample after just one treatment.

This is no infomercial guys, this is real life.

According to our source, Rodale’s OrganicLife, the best news is that the compound is both nontoxic and inexpensive to produce, which means a large-scale cleanup of contaminated water or soil is a more attainable task than ever before.