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These microbes are surprisingly hard to scale up i.e. to make them work on large amounts of product at a time. (My wife did research on such bugs for a while). All sorts of things start happening once you have a lot of them, and the process becomes incredibly tricky to keep going.
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(Paraphrasing because of my limited understanding of what my wife did) The biological pathway that makes them eat plastic is pretty card to keep activated. It's not a very profitable pathway, so the bugs tend to try eating other stuff if there is even a little available, or they are even a little outside the optimal range for eating plastic.
Wonder if CRISPR or similar could be used to knock out regular metabolism pathways. Seems like they'd be understood enough to do so effectively.
Is anyone else concerned about the effects this could have if it managed to get out of containment and into the wild? A self-replicating bacteria that eats plastics sounds like a potentially catastrophic event, considering how much we use them in day to day life.
Wood is easily degradable under the right conditions, but that isn’t a major problem for us. I’m almost certain, for example, that 99% of plastic in use today is in environments that are too dry for bacteria.
Is anyone else concerned about the effects this could have if it managed to get out of containment and into the wild? A self-replicating bacteria that eats plastics sounds like a potentially catastrophic event, considering how much we use them in day to day life.
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A bactery that eat oil and you have the movie mad max
There are cureently bacteria that eat diesel/gasoline, which is why if you leave either in your vehicle tank for a long period (1-6 months) , you shoud to siphon it out and replace it.
Gasoline and diesel go bad because they are solutions of many hydrocarbons, and the lighter hydrocarbons are the first to evaporate, leaving a heavier-than-intended slurry of what's left plus accrued moisture from atmosphere.
It has little to nothing to do with bacterial growth.
'Fuel Stabilizer', additives that are intended to be added to tanks of vehicles which must have fuel sitting in them for prolonged periods, are oils which are designed to prevent the evaporation of the lighter hydrocarbons and prevent water infiltration; usually through the use of molecules that either bond with water readily, or by layering oil atop the fuel mass to encapsulate it from evaporation to atmosphere.
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Wonder if CRISPR or similar could be used to knock out regular metabolism pathways. Seems like they'd be understood enough to do so effectively.
Once those microbes become efficient, say goodbye to specific plastics as a durable material for regular use. The microbes wouldn't know the difference between trash and in-use material.
Essentially none would survive outside designated plastic eating situations.
Until ... life finds a way ...
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Some usages of plastics are essential. What about in medicine for example?
Right, exactly. A runaway bacterium that ate medical equipment, electronic equipment, industrial equipment, vehicles, food packaging... that would be a Bad Thing. It would mean an end to much of the modern world. I'm reminded of a reddit discussion on how awful it would be if a coronal mass ejection event destroyed all electronics on Earth. They were lamenting how tragic the loss of Netflix would be given the current…
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There are cureently bacteria that eat diesel/gasoline, which is why if you leave either in your vehicle tank for a long period (1-6 months) , you shoud to siphon it out and replace it.
No. Gasoline and diesel go bad because they are solutions of many hydrocarbons, and the lighter hydrocarbons are the first to evaporate, leaving a heavier-than-intended slurry of what's left plus accrued moisture from atmosphere. It has little to nothing to do with bacterial growth. 'Fuel Stabilizer', additives that are intended to be added to tanks of vehicles which must have fuel sitting in them for prolonged perio…
You didn't mention ethanol but that's what you mean. Normal gasoline is very stable, it's just the federally-mandated corn ethanol added to it that turns into sludge after a few months. Fuel stabilizer keeps that ethanol from degrading.
I would advise anyone with small engines, like lawnmowers or snowblowers, to seek out ethanol-free gasoline and use that exclusively in those engines.
Is anyone else concerned about the effects this could have if it managed to get out of containment and into the wild? A self-replicating bacteria that eats plastics sounds like a potentially catastrophic event, considering how much we use them in day to day life.
a plastic eating pathogen is a prominent actor in 'The Andromeda Strain' [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Andromeda_Strain
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Right, exactly. A runaway bacterium that ate medical equipment, electronic equipment, industrial equipment, vehicles, food packaging... that would be a Bad Thing. It would mean an end to much of the modern world. I'm reminded of a reddit discussion on how awful it would be if a coronal mass ejection event destroyed all electronics on Earth. They were lamenting how tragic the loss of Netflix would be given the current…
On the one hand I understand what you are saying, but on the other hand we've only had good plastics for a couple decades.
We've only had widespread electronics for a handful of decades, but if we lost it overnight, we'd be unable to produce and distribute food at the necessary scale. Restoring the global economy wouldn't even be on the horizon, we'd be too busy dying of famine.
We've only had the internal combustion engine for a handful of decades, but if we lost it overnight we'd be similarly ruined.
If the bacteria only slowly ate plastics, we wouldn't be doomed, it would just make things more costly, as with way rust and rot.