Loneliness is creeping into the lives of young adults. A new study sheds light that loneliness follows a U-shaped curve, starting in young adulthood, easing during midlife, and spiking again in older age. With more people turning to online interactions for connections, many young people are struggling with isolation.

Loneliness isn't just an emotional burden — it’s a health risk. Research has linked prolonged feelings of isolation to heart disease, dementia, and even suicidal thoughts. Experts warn that if we don't actively nurture our social lives, we risk weakening our “social muscles.”

What can be done? There are practical steps for people of all ages to foster connections and avoid the loneliness trap. From doing a “relationship audit” to evaluate the quality of your friendships, to joining local clubs or groups, or even cutting back on social media. Experts believe that these are small actions that can make a big difference.

Single-use plastics have long been a concerning environmental issue but we’re seeing creative developments that aim at managing the harm. Naturalist Julia Marsh has dedicated her career to tackling over-use of plastic in packaging, specifically targeting the fashion industry. The alternative she found was wild. Literally.

Seaweed was the answer. On a trip to Indonesia with her partner Marsh toured the country’s seaweed farms and found it to be a sustainable building block for bioplastics. The crop would regenerate quickly and require “really low carbon usage, really low energy.” She also found that growing seaweed would need no additional resources: “No fertilizer, no arable land — no fresh water.” Seaweed farms had the added environmental benefit of serving as water filtration systems.

So they founded Sway. After some “disturbing looking prototypes,” a new materials engineer, and a few months of thin-film prototypes, the startup managed to secure a USD 2.5 mn investment. There they perfected their flagship material and tested its decomposition by placing two centimeter squares in cups on dirt and, surely enough, the pieces measured at one centimeter just two weeks later.

A bump in the road. The Sway team is struggling with melting the bioplastic, which defeats the purpose of selling plastic bags at scale, since they need to be melted down before they could be shaped. Unlike oil-based plastics, seaweed burns. They are still conducting chemical experiments and stretch tests in hopes to find a solution.

Some believe a different approach needs to be taken to single-use plastics. Kjell Olac Maldum, managing Director at Infinitum — a company that manages a collect system to recycle bottles made of polyethylene terephthalate — believes that traditional plastic is a critical part of modernity. “Try to run a hospital without plastic. Try to run a society without plastic. It’s not possible,” he told Wired. He believes that the real issue is the initial idea that plastic products are used just once. The solution should be society focusing on recycling the plastic so that it doesn't end up in the ocean or the soil, instead of finding an ineffective alternative.

Whose responsibility is it though? Jason Hawkins, CEO and founder of Reusables — which offers reusable containers for takeaway, which customers can later return to one of the company’s networks — believes that “it’s not up to people to be sustainable — it’s up to businesses and government to create the right infrastructure.”

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