http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/10/watch-these-wooden-sponges-wick-spilled-oil

Oil spills are messy and harmful to local ecosystems—just ask anyone on the Louisiana coast. So far, there’s no foolproof way to clean them up, and some methods—like burning the oil—can result in even more pollution. Now, researchers have come up with a potential solution: reusable, oil-wicking sponges made of wood that can absorb more than 40 times their weight in oil.

To make the sponges, scientists started with balsa wood, a low-density material often used in model airplanes. The researchers used chemicals to break down the wood’s cell walls and remove the polymers, lignin and hemicellulose, that make it rigid and strong. The resulting highly porous “scaffold” had a density just one-third that of balsa wood. The researchers then topped the scaffold with a coating that repelled water but readily absorbed oil.