{"id":48443,"date":"2018-04-17T10:50:47","date_gmt":"2018-04-17T14:50:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planetsave.com\/?p=48443"},"modified":"2018-04-17T10:50:47","modified_gmt":"2018-04-17T14:50:47","slug":"teenage-mutant-ninja-enzyme-chews-through-plastic-waste","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planetsave.com\/articles\/teenage-mutant-ninja-enzyme-chews-through-plastic-waste\/","title":{"rendered":"Teenage Mutant Ninja Enzyme Chews Through Plastic Waste"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sometimes, new products get invented by accident<\/a>. Potato chips, for example. The microwave, the ink jet printer, and the implantable pacemaker are on the list. My personal favorite involves scientists searching for a powerful new adhesive that could be used to glue airplanes together. They failed miserably and created one of the weakest adhesives ever known — which was perfect for making Post It notes.\u00a0 Now scientists from the US Department of Energy\u2019s National Renewable Energy Laboratory, the University of Portsmouth in the UK, and the University of South Florida have accidentally discovered an enzyme that feasts on polyethylene terephthalate (PET), returning it to its original components. PET makes up about 20% of all the plastic waste in the world.<\/p>\n

Plastic Eating Bugs In Japan<\/h3>\n

\"\"<\/a>The researchers began by examining a bacterium first discovered at a waste dump in Japan in 2016. The bacterium was able to break down some plastic waste, but how? The scientists discovered the tiny bug produced an enzyme that could break down PET. They used the Diamond Light Source<\/a> located near Oxford to study the enzyme. The Diamond Light Source produces an X-ray beam that is 10 billion times brighter than the sun. It is so bright, it can reveal individual atoms.<\/p>\n

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According to The Guardian<\/a>,<\/em> “The structure of the enzyme looked very similar to one evolved by many bacteria to break down cutin, a natural polymer used as a protective coating by plants. But when the team manipulated the enzyme to explore this connection, they accidentally improved its ability to eat PET.” Professor John McGeehan of the University of Portsmouth says, “What actually turned out was we improved the enzyme, which was a bit of a shock. It\u2019s great and a real finding.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe originally set out to determine how this enzyme evolved from breaking down cutin — the waxy substance on the surface of plants– with cutinase, to degrading synthetic PET with PETase,\u201d says Greg Beckham of NREL<\/a>. \u201cWe 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. What we\u2019ve learned is that PETase is not yet fully optimized to degrade PET\u2014and now that we\u2019ve shown this, it\u2019s time to apply the tools of protein engineering and evolution to continue to improve it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Unlocking A Door<\/h3>\n

In practice, the modified enzyme is only 20% better at breaking down PET than the original, but that’s not the point, says McGeehan.\u00a0\u201cIt\u2019s incredible because it tells us that the enzyme is not yet optimized. It gives us scope to use all the technology used in other enzyme development for years and years and make a super-fast enzyme.\u201d Other industrial enzymes have been made to work up to 1,000 times faster within a few years of their discovery.<\/p>\n

“What we are hoping to do is use this enzyme to turn this plastic back into its original components, so we can literally recycle it back to plastic,\u201d says McGeehan. \u201cIt means we won\u2019t need to dig up any more oil and, fundamentally, it should reduce the amount of plastic in the environment.\u201d Now that the door has been opened, enzymes that dissolve other forms of plastic may be found in the lab. The dream is that someday, the huge mounds of plastic waste found in the world’s oceans could be treated chemically from the air, rendering them harmless to the environment and aquatic animals.<\/p>\n