Freak new enzyme offer a ray of hope in war on plastics

Scientists have accidentally developed a plastic eating enzyme that may be used to combat one of the world's worst pollution problems, a media report said.

The discovery could result in a recycling solution for millions of tonnes of plastic bottles made of polyethylene terephthalate. 

Researchers from Britain's University of Portsmouth and the US Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) made the discovery while examining the structure of a natural enzyme found in a waste recycling centre a few years ago in Japan.

They said the enzyme, Ideonella sakaiensis 201-F6, is able to "eat"polyethylene terephtha1 ate, PET, which was patented as a plastic in the 1940s and is used in millions of tonnes of plastic bottles. Their aim was to study its structure, but they accidentally engineered an enzyme which was even better at breaking down PET plastics.

"We hoped to determine its,
structure to aid in protein engineering, but we ended up going a step further and accidentally engineered an enzyme with
improved performance at breaking down these plastics, " said NREL's lead researcher Gregg Beckham.

The discovery could result in a recycling solution for millions  of tonnes of plastic bottles made  ofPET, which currently persists  for hundreds of years in the environmental, the University of Portsmouth said on its website. "Serendipity often plays a significant role in fundamental scientific research and our discovery here is no exception,"said  Professor McGeehan, director of
the Institute of Biological and
Biomedical Sciences in the School of Biological Sciences at Portsmouth . The enzyme can also degrade polyethylene furandicarboxyl ate, or PEF, a bio-based substitute for PET plastics that is being hailed as a replacement for glass
beer bottles.


Facts about plastic bottles :-

1. Approximately 60 million plastic water bottles are used every day in the US,

2.  Nearly 18,756,100,000 end up in the landfill each year.

3.  Each bottle can take up to 700 years to decompose.

4. 80% of plastic bottles are not recycled

5. Land occupied but each plastic bottle or cover goes unused forever and there will be no more plant growth in that particular areas

6. Burning plastic bottles generates toxic fumes that causes health hazards

Source : Internet  HT Times
Image and Video Editor :- Mr Aman Kashyap