- Title: This bacterial cocktail eats plastic within weeks
- Date: 23rd December 2020
- Summary: BUDAPEST, HUNGARY (DECEMBER 21, 2020) (REUTERS) SCIENTIST LIZ MADARAS TEARING UP PLASTIC SHEET IN A LABORATORY MADARAS HOLDING UP PIECE OF PLASTIC IN A LAB WITH COLLEAGUE KRISZTINA LEVAY (SOUNDBITE) (English) LIZ MADARAS AND KRISZTINA LEVAY INTRODUCING THEMSELVES AND MADARAS SAYING: "We are the co-founders of Poliloop. A Hungarian bio-tech company which has developed plastic eating bacteria." LEVAY OPENING DOOR OF INCUBATOR AND SAYING: "So they are living here, our bacteria." LEVAY ARRANGING TUBES OF BACTERIA COCKTAILS (SOUNDBITE) (English) LIZ MADARAS HOLDING TRAY OF BACTERIA COCKTAILS AND SAYING: "We have a couple of cocktails here, special mixtures for special things, and I think a couple of purified strains as well, yes, one purified strain here." (SOUNDBITE) (English) CEO OF POLILOOP LIZ MADARAS SAYING: "(It is) Bacterial cocktail which metabolises plastics. And this is because one bacteria could not do all that because plastics are very very complicated molecules and they are very big and quite diverse if we look at how many plastics we actually use in our day to day lives." LEVAY ARRANGING VARIOUS PLASTICS WASTE IN THEIR STORE ROOM MADARAS PICKING UP SHREDS OF PARTIALLY DEGRADED PLASTICS (SOUNDBITE) (English) CEO OF POLILOOP LIZ MADARAS SAYING: "This is how it is going to look like in two weeks." MADARAS TOUCHING SHREDS OF PLASTIC VARIOUS OF PLASTICS AND THEIR STATE AFTER TWO WEEKS OF DEGRADATION (SOUNDBITE) (English) CEO OF POLILOOP LIZ MADARAS SAYING: "In seven weeks time it goes to this: this sludge, which is the end product of our process." (SOUNDBITE) (English) KRISZTINA LEVAY SHOWING SLUDGE IN BOTTLE SAYING: "This is the first experience before we started the process." SLUDGE IN BOTTLE (SOUNDBITE) (English) CEO OF POLILOOP LIZ MADARAS SAYING: "The degradation process is very similar to how those leaves disappear from autumn to springtime. A consortia of microbes biodegrades them. And this is what we were doing with our bacteria and fossil-based plastics. A very important note is that in our case bioplastics aren't a contaminant either because our bacteria can very easily biodegrade PLA as well." LEVAY PREPARING FOR EXPERIMENT LEVAY PUTTING BLUE LIQUID INTO CONTAINER VARIOUS OF MADARAS PUTTING BROWN LIQUID INTO CONTAINER (SOUNDBITE) (English) CEO OF POLILOOP LIZ MADARAS SAYING: "There are successful attempts with PET degradation though. But in our case we do all types of plastics from resin identification one through seven and that includes other plastics as well such as multilayer packaging or mixed plastic blends." MADARAS AND LEVAY WORKING TOGETHER ON EXPERIMENT VARIOUS OF MADARAS PUTTING LIQUID INTO CONTAINER (SOUNDBITE) (English) CEO OF POLILOOP LIZ MADARAS SAYING: "We saw plastic waste pollution as a very very pertinent issue. So we decided to try to combine biotechnology and chemical engineering to create a media which can actually bring plastics back into the natural life cycle to which they once belonged." BACTERIA COCKTAIL IN HAND MADARAS AND LEVAY DISCUSSING (SOUNDBITE) (English) CEO OF POLILOOP LIZ MADARAS SAYING: "If it works on a large scale it can make a global impact because the problem with plastics up until now was that they lingered on in the environment for ever. But once we can biodegrade them, bring them back into the natural environment they become part of nature again, become part of the global recycling system not just the human one." MADARAS AND LEVAY ARRANGING PLASTICS ON TABLE LEVAY LOOKING AT PLASTIC PLASTIC SHREDS IN CUP
- Embargoed: 6th January 2021 15:27
- Keywords: Bacteria cocktail eats plastic pollution Budapest Hungary Krisztina Levay Liz Madaras Poliloop biochemists microplastic plastic pollution seven weeks to break down any type of plastic
- Location: BUDAPEST, HUNGARY/ CHRISTMAS ISLAND, AUSTRALIA / SOUTHAMPTON, ENGLAND, UK
- City: BUDAPEST, HUNGARY/ CHRISTMAS ISLAND, AUSTRALIA / SOUTHAMPTON, ENGLAND, UK
- Country: United Kingdom
- Topics: Pollution,Environment,Europe
- Reuters ID: LVA001DA89X6H
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: A biotech start-up says its cocktail of bacteria can eat any type of plastic within weeks, offering a potential solution to the global pollution problem.
Budapest-based Poliloop, founded by biochemists Liz Madaras and Krisztina Levay, say their solution consumes any single-use plastic in seven weeks without prior chemical treatment or processing.
"We saw plastic waste pollution as a very pertinent issue. We decided to try to combine biotechnology and chemical engineering to create a media which can actually bring plastics back into the natural life cycle to which they once belonged," Liz Madaras told Reuters.
Scientists in Britain and the United States have previously engineered a plastic-eating enzyme that can digest polyethylene terephthalate, or PET, a common form of plastic packaging that can persist for hundreds of years in the environment. But Poliloop say their 'cocktail' can degrade all 7 types of plastic listed in the international coding system, including multilayer packaging and mixed plastic blends.
The degradation process produces shreds of plastics within 2 weeks, then by the end of 7 weeks they become a brown liquid "sludge".
Initial laboratory tests show that the sludge is safe to use as a soil improver, Madaras said.
"If it works on a large scale it can make a global impact because the problem with plastics up until now was that they lingered on in the environment for ever. But once we can biodegrade them, bring them back into the natural environment they become part of nature again, become part of the global recycling system not just the human one," Madaras said.
Poliloop is now planning to build an industrial scale demonstration plant with investment from Techstars and Vespucci Partners in Hungary.
The company say they want to know what other pollutants their cocktail can digest and are now turning their attention from plastics to diesel.
(Production: Krisztina Fenyo) - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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