I haven't seen it for sale, and judging from what I just read on the web, the amount of pollution that it absorbs does not look to be statistically significant over other S. microphyllas. Good marketing ploy though... a new hybrid plant to help sell hybrid cars? ;)

-Michelle

There is no scientific data to back up anyone's claim one way or the other. But your right, I guess "Kirsch" got a nice bonus for coming up with that Idea.
Art

Aas a natural products chemist, I don't buy it, especially without documentation to support it.

Kind a like what is going on in lots of science with "altered" and " tricked" out basic Data where they give one thermometer in Sandiego that is surrounded by parking lot and give it a factor of 300 to make it more important than many other thermometers at weather stations in the wild.. Even science is corruptible. Garbage in / garbage out. Who can one believe in.

That's why papers to refereed journals are more credible. Also, it is a lot harder to fool around with the hard sciences like chemistry and physics. Economics is in no position to try verifying or falsifying its macroeconomic hypotheses with experiments, so I don't put a lot of weight on its theories. Then we get virtual experiments like free trade anyway.

In botany, the problem is getting participants to agree on definitions and assumptions. The time scales involved also complicate tests and proofs.

While "pollution absorbing" salvias sounds nice, personally, I'd rather see salvias that are bred for super nectar production and long bloom season... my hummingbirds are so spoiled. :)