A new way to break down PET plastics

 https://www.dw.com/en/plastic-packaging-might-be-biodegradable-after-all/a-61948136

 

Since the discovery of LCC, researchers like Sonnendecker have been looking for new PET-eating enzymes in nature. LCC is good, they say, but it has limitations. It is fast for what it is, but it still takes days to break down PET and the reactions have to occur at very high temperatures.

Other scientists and researchers have been trying to figure out how to engineer LCC to make it more efficient.

A French company called Carbios is doing that. They are engineering LCC to create a faster, more efficient enzyme.

Elsewhere, researchers at the University of Texas in Austin have created a PET-eating protein using a machine learning algorithm. They say their protein can degrade PET plastic in 24 hours.

 

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The search continues, but they're finding better and better tools to degrade PET plastic!

 

a new way to recycle plastic

 https://futurism.com/the-byte/scientists-new-enzyme-break-down-plastic-week

 

The fact that PET plastic can be turned back into virgin plastic is a big deal.

“This has advantages over traditional belt recycling,” Hal Alper, professor in chemical engineering and author on the paper, told Vice. “If you were to melt the plastic and then remold it, you’d start to lose the integrity of the plastic each round that you go through with recycling.”

This new method, however, can be used to make “virgin PET plastic each and every time,” Alper added.

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This is only for PET plastic, and they don't know yet how to ramp it up commercially, but it's a good hope.