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Have you ever thought about what makes soil healthy? ā probably not, unless youāre a farmer! But healthy soil is so much more than mere dirt on the soles of our shoes. A healthy soil is a living, dynamic ecosystem, teeming with microscopic and larger organisms. In fact, you probably didnāt know this, but there are more microorganisms in a handful of soil than there are people on the planet!
Healthy soils produce healthy crops that in turn nourish people and animals. It acts as a filter for underground water and filters out pollutants. And interestingly, healthy soil consists of about 25% air! How else would those little worms breath! Worms are critical, enriching topsoil by feeding on organic material in the soil and converting it into nutrients for plants. Soil is at the bottom of the food chain, yet it is the cornerstone of life on earth.
š²It would probably surprise you to know that animal hair is a great source of nitrogen, one of the two main components needed in any compost (the other is carbon). So why are we telling you this? Because if youāre a pet loverš¹š°š»š¶š±šÆš“ but not a lover of pet hair all over your furniture, then guess what, you can add all that pet fluff to your compost pileš Waste not, want not peeps!ššš
Breakthrough that builds on plastic-eating bugs first discovered by Japan in 2016 promises to enable full recycling
Breakthrough that builds on plastic-eating bugs first discovered by Japan in 2016 promises to enable full recycling
A super-enzyme that degrades plastic bottles six times faster than before has been created by scientists and could be used for recycling within a year or two.
The super-enzyme, derived from bacteria that naturally evolved the ability to eat plastic, enables the full recycling of the bottles. Scientists believe combining it with enzymes that break down cotton could also allow mixed-fabric clothing to be recycled. Today,Ā millions of tonnesĀ of such clothing is either dumped in landfill or incinerated.
Plastic pollution has contaminated the whole planet, from theĀ ArcticĀ to theĀ deepest oceans, and people are now known toĀ consumeĀ andĀ breathe microplastic particles. It is currently very difficult to break down plastic bottles into their chemical constituents in order to make new ones from old, meaning more new plastic is being created from oil each year.
The super-enzyme was engineered by linking two separate enzymes, both of which were found in the plastic-eating bug discovered at aĀ Japanese waste site in 2016. The researchers revealed an engineered version of theĀ first enzyme in 2018, which started breaking down the plastic in a few days. But the super-enzyme gets to work six times faster.
āWhen we linked the enzymes, rather unexpectedly, we got a dramatic increase in activity,ā said Prof John McGeehan, at the University of Portsmouth, UK. āThis is a trajectory towards trying to make faster enzymes that are more industrially relevant. But itās also one of those stories about learning from nature, and then bringing it into the lab.ā
French companyĀ Carbios revealed a different enzyme in April, originally discovered in a compost heap of leaves, that degrades 90% of plastic bottles within 10 hours, but requires heating above 70C.
The new super-enzyme works at room temperature, and McGeehan said combining different approaches could speed progress towards commercial use: āIf we can make better, faster enzymes by linking them together and provide them to companies like Carbios, and work in partnership, we could start doing this within the next year or two.ā
The 2018 work had determined that the structure of one enzyme, called PETase, can attack the hard, crystalline surface of plastic bottles. They found, by accident, that one mutant version worked 20% faster. The new study analysed a second enzyme also found in the Japanese bacteria that doubles the speed of the breakdown of the chemical groups liberated by the first enzyme.
Bacteria that break down natural polymers like cellulose have evolved this twin approach over millions of years. The scientists thought by connecting the two enzymes together, it might increase the speed of degradation, and enable them to work more closely together.
The linked super-enzyme would be impossible for a bacterium to create, as the molecule would be too large. So the scientists connected the two enzymes in the laboratory and saw a further tripling of the speed. The new research by scientists at the University of Portsmouth and four US institutions is published in the journalĀ Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The team is now examining how the enzymes can be tweaked to make them work even faster still. āThereās huge potential,ā said McGeehan. āWeāve got several hundred in the lab that weāre currently sticking together.ā A Ā£1m testing centre is now being built in Portsmouth and Carbios is currently building a plant in Lyon.
Combining the plastic-eating enzymes with existing ones that break down natural fibres could allow mixed materials to be fully recycled, McGeehan said. āMixed fabrics [of polyester and cotton] are really tricky to recycle. Weāve been speaking to some of the big fashion companies that produce these textiles, because theyāre really struggling at the moment.ā
Campaigners say reducing the use of plastic is key. Those working on recycling say that strong, lightweight materials like plastic are very useful and that true recycling is part of the solution to the pollution problem.
Researchers have also been successful in findingĀ bugs that eat other plastics such as polyurethane, which is widely used but rarely recycled. When polyurethane breaks down it can release toxic chemicals that would kill most bacteria, but the bug identified actually uses the material as food to power the process.
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