Biodegradation of different PET variants from food containers by Ideonella sakaiensis

The accumulation of macro-, micro- and nano-plastic wastes in the environment is a major global concern, as these materials are resilient to degradation processes. However, microorganisms have evolved their own biological means to metabolize these petroleum-derived polymers, e.g., Ideonella sakaiens...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Archives of microbiology 2022-12, Vol.204 (12), p.711-711, Article 711
Main Authors: Walter, Andreas, Sopracolle, Laura, Mutschlechner, Mira, Spruck, Martin, Griesbeck, Christoph
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Biochemistry
Biodegradation
Biomedical and Life Sciences
Biotechnology
Brief Report
Carbon sources
Cell Biology
Containers
Crystallinity
Ecology
Food packaging
Life Sciences
Microbial Ecology
Microbiology
Microorganisms
Plastic debris
Polyethylene terephthalate
Polymerase chain reaction
Polymers
Real time
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Summary:The accumulation of macro-, micro- and nano-plastic wastes in the environment is a major global concern, as these materials are resilient to degradation processes. However, microorganisms have evolved their own biological means to metabolize these petroleum-derived polymers, e.g., Ideonella sakaiensis has recently been found to be capable of utilizing polyethylene terephthalate (PET) as its sole carbon source. This study aims to prove its potential capacity to biodegrade two commercial PET materials, obtained from food packaging containers. Plastic pieces of different crystallinity were simultaneously introduced to Ideonella sakaiensis during a seven-week lasting investigation. Loss in weight, appearance of plastics, as well as growth of Ideonella sakaiensis —through quantitative real-time PCR—were determined. Both plastics were found enzymatically attacked in a two-stage degradation process, reaching biodegradation capacities of up to 96%. Interestingly, the transparent, high crystallinity PET was almost fully degraded first, followed by the colored low-crystallinity PET. Results of quantitative real-time PCR-based gene copy numbers were found in line with experimental results, thus underlining its potential of this method to be applied in future studies with Ideonella sakaiensis .
ISSN:0302-8933
1432-072X
DOI:10.1007/s00203-022-03306-w