Plastic Eating Bacteria – Plastic pollution is one of the main problems on earth. However, recently scientists have found a creative solution, namely by utilizing plastic-eating bacteria.
Not only do they devour plastic, but uniquely, these bacteria can turn marine plastic into CO2. This is based on a recent study in January 2023 by the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research (NIOZ) that looked at the bacterium Rhodococcus ruber.
The lead investigator, Ph.D. student Maaike Goudriaan, conducted this lab experiment as a model study. He treated a special plastic (containing a certain type of carbon, namely as13C) with a UV lamp (acts as sunlight) in an artificial bottle.
The sunlight helps break down some of the plastic into smaller pieces that are most likely food for bacteria. Goudriaan also did the same, namely by giving plastic and light to bacteria. This produces a special form of carbon that appears as CO2 in water.
The Role of the Bacterium Rhodococcus Ruber
In essence, Goudriaan found that the bacterium Rhodococcus ruber actually digests plastic and turns it into CO2 and other substances. “This is the first time we have proven that in this way bacteria actually digest plastic into CO2 and other molecules,” said Goudriaan, as reported by ScienceDaily.
Goudriaan stressed that this is certainly not a solution to the problem of plastic in the oceans. “As per the findings, bacteria can only break down about 1 percent of the plastic they put into CO2 and other harmless substances,” he said.
The next step in this research is to apply this research model in nature. The goal is none other than to see if the bacteria can really be used to eat plastic in the wild.
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Plastic Pollution Prevention Priority
Goudriaan has conducted several informal experiments on this subject and suggests that plastic is degradable, even in nature.
Despite this, Goudriaan stated that it is far better to prevent plastic than to clean it up. A similar study was also conducted by the Polytechnic University of Hong Kong in April 2021 They published the results of their research using the bacterium Pseudomonas aeruginosa to break down microplastics in the laboratory.
They used the bacteria to make bacterial biofilms. The scientists then used this to trap sticky microbes in water filled with microplastics. The biofilm traps the microplastics and sinks them together, and the researchers are successful in extracting the microplastics from the water.