I tend to believe that, if it's good enough for NASA, it's probably good enough for my home. You know, with the exception of the astronaut food -- yuck. And so, hearing that bringing plants indoors is a secret weapon for NASA was all the convincing I needed to start bringing some of my greenery inside.

There are loads of benefits to having plants in your home, beginning with air quality. NASA sponsored research on the removal of chemicals from the air by plants, and found that houseplants helped remove pollutants like benzene, ammonia, and formaldehyde from the air.

Additionally, there's something called the Biophilia Hypothesis, which basically means that our ancestors might have passed on to us a desire to live in green, natural spaces -- a survival advantage for them. What that means for us is that we have a natural inclination toward other living things, and that simply keeping houseplants around could elicit a "feel good" response.

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Revolution Health has a new interactive tool, momScore, that ranks states based on the accessibility and quality of maternal health care. To determine the score, a team of health experts compared state-to-state criteria including:

• Access to prenatal care
• Maternal mortality
• Risk of pregnancy complications
• Childcare availability per capita
• Infant mortality
• Air quality
• Violent crime rate
• Access to health insurance
• Affordability of children's health insurance
• Mandatory paid leave policy
  

You can check your state's score overall or by specific health topic. My state ranked roughly in the middle, which was what I expected to see. Where does your state rank?

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Though he claims he never had allergies before moving here to my hometown 10 years ago, my husband came home after a recent allergy test with a sheet filled with items that he reacted to. While I doubt all of his allergies cropped up in the last decade, I do know that our area is bad for people who suffer respiratory illnesses. Though we have no intentions of moving, if we ever do, air quality will definitely be on my list of things to consider.

The Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America recently named the worst cities for allergy sufferers in America. They ranked their cities by pollen counts, medication usage, and the number of board certified allergists per patient.

The top five include:

• Lexington, KY
• Greensboro, NC
• Johnson City, TN
• Augusta, GA
• Jackson, MS
  

Spring is a notorious time for allergy sufferers. Learn more about prevention and treatment at AOL Body's allergy center.

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It's amazing to hear that nearly two billion citizens across the globe could create a rising amount of poor health due to the rise of "dirty energy."

Dirty energy can come in the form of air pollution and exposure to smoke from open fires, among many other things. In other words, the burning of coal to power electric grids is generally not all that healthy to live near (or breathe, of course).

A recent report in the medical journal The Lancet stated that 2.4 billion people worldwide were exposed to pollution from inefficient burning of solid fuels like wood, coal and dried cow dung.

So, in the march to get that energy into the electric grid or for heating, the inefficiency of many methods in several countries could cause escalating problems with the health of nearby citizens.

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Living with the fear of bad air? If you're in a heavily-industrialized city in the U.S. or anywhere, you probably have the term "smog" stamped on your forehead. It's pretty well-known that too much smog inhalation is, umm, not really good for health.

Even if you are a young, healthy adult, bad air quality can trigger adverse health complications, according to a new respiratory study of of Taiwan (of all places). If you've ever seen Taipei, you'll know smog all too well.

The issue here is that these adverse conditions involve possible cardiovascular problems -- even in these young adults. We're not talking about the elderly or toddlers with overexposed or underdeveloped respiratory systems, but completely healthy people. If one were to do a chemical analysis of smog in many cities, I'd be afraid to look at the results. You?

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Not too many people I know of are fans of smog. Wait a minute -- scratch that; nobody I know of likes smog. If you're not into smog, you probably look for places to live and work that have decent air quality. It's too bad that one of the most exciting cities on the planet, Low Angeles, isn't tops when it comes to air quality.

On the America Lung Association's most recent list of the most polluted cities in America (when it comes to air), LA topped the list. Sadly, it has not been the first time this has happened.

But, Southern California citizens should not fret -- cities like Pittsburgh and Detroit were following right behind. Are you satisfied with the air quality where you live? Why or why not?

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How "good" is the air you breathe each and every day? If you live in a big city, the quality is probably not the best in the world -- and in fact, it can be downright tyrannical over your respiratory system in some cases. I've known some people who had to move due to having bad respiratory conditions due to local air.

In a new study published just last week in the New England Journal of Medicine, a final conclusion was that where you live in a city is more important than which city you live in. Closeness to the vagaries of heavy air pollution, in other words, could take a larger toll on health than actually living in a city known for subpar air quality.

No wonder the suburbs are more comfortable for many citizens, eh?

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