Scientists from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore have created an artificial bacterial environment capable of digesting plastic, replicating the intestines of worms of the Zophobas atratus species. Scaling up this approach could increase progress in the fight against pollution of the world with plastic waste.

In the last decade, Lepidoptera and the larvae of Lepidoptera insects, e.g. Tenebrio molitor, Spodoptera frugiperda, Galleria mellonella And Zophobas atratus They have demonstrated their ability to break down plastic. Specifically, screening the gut microbiome of these worms revealed new types of bacteria that specialize in this: Klebsiella sp. EMBL-1, Massilia sp. FS1903, Pseudomonas sp. EDB1, Bacillus sp. EDA4 And Brevibacterium sp. EDX.

However, feeding polymer waste directly to worms turned out to be inefficient; an individual eats only a few milligrams of plastic over his lifetime, so implementing the method on an industrial scale would require large numbers of worms, which would be unprofitable.

The results of a new study published in the journal International Environment (EnvInt) Scientists from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore decided to create a scaled-up replica of the intestinal environment of these superworms, and they believe it could sustainably recycle significant amounts of waste plastic. By purchasing five-week-old worms to feed pet reptiles from a local pet store (Zophobas atratus), they divided them into groups and fed them high-density polyethylene, polypropylene and polystyrene for 30 days.

The scientists then extracted microbiomes from the guts of the plastic-chewing worms and incubated them in vials filled with synthetic nutrients and three plastics, allowing them to grow into an artificial gut, a process that took six weeks. The plastic diet had little effect on bacterial diversity, but significantly shifted the relative abundance of pre-existing microbes in favor of potential plastids.

Taxa with plastic-degrading species became more enriched, while other taxa represented by lactic acid bacteria became extinct. This allowed us to assume incubation. in a laboratory environment It increases the decomposition potential of plastic.

“By exposing the gut microbiomes to certain conditions, we were able to increase the number of plastic-degrading bacteria present in our artificial ‘wormgut’. This highlights the stability and scalability of our method,” said the study’s first author, Dr. Liu Yinan.

Team now examines underlying molecular biology of the gut Zophobas atratusUnderstanding how biological tissue can withstand these processes that go beyond native nature. The answer will bring him closer to discovering the formula for low-cost, large-scale cultivation of environmentally harmful plastic-degrading bacterial communities.