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Post by ZandraJoi on Mar 3, 2022 21:21:02 GMT -5
www.naturalawakenings.com/2022/02/28/389229/bacteria-may-become-plastic-pathfinders "Millions of tons of plastic are dumped in the environment annually, and reducing that amount is critical. A study by the Chalmers University of Technology, in Sweden, published in the journal Microbial Ecology, discovered that microbes in oceans and soils worldwide are evolving to eat plastic. The research scanned more than 200 million genes found in DNA samples taken from the environment and found 30,000 different enzymes that could degrade 10 different types of plastic. This is the first, large-scale, global evaluation of the plastic-degrading potential of bacteria, which found that one in four of the organisms analyzed carried a suitable enzyme. The researchers observed that the number and type of enzymes matched those of plastic pollution in various locations. Many plastics are hard to degrade and recycle. The explosion of plastic production in the past 70 years, from 2 million metric tons to 380 million metric tons a year, has given microbes time to evolve to deal with plastic. Using enzymes to rapidly break down plastics into their respective building blocks will allow new products to be made from the old, decreasing the need for new production. This research highlights new enzymes that could be adapted for industrial use." My notes: I wonder tho if there will be repercussions. Just like if a human or creature ingests plastic, which is not natural, we can get sick.
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Post by Bob on Mar 9, 2022 20:05:07 GMT -5
Doesn't sound right, but hey, what do I know!
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nomad
Astronaut
Posts: 443
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Post by nomad on Jun 21, 2022 10:15:01 GMT -5
I don't know about ocean microbes eating plastic but I have heard of worms that eat plastic. We need to see what kind of poop these worms bring out. I hope that is not plastic.
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Post by ZandraJoi on Jun 23, 2022 10:48:17 GMT -5
I don't know about ocean microbes eating plastic but I have heard of worms that eat plastic. We need to see what kind of poop these worms bring out. I hope that is not plastic. That's my thought as well! How do they digest it? Does it become 'something' else in the literal end? To me, plastic is from oil & oil remains oil so I don't know how well this even works.
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