Plastics that support Modern life is inexpensive, strong and versatile, but are difficult to organize and have a serious impact Shee noted in the environment. Polyethylene, in particular, is plastic widely produced worldwide, with more than 100 million tonnes distributed each year. Since this can take decades to decompose – and along the way can harm the fauna and degrade in harmful microplastics – the elimination of ITES is an urgent problem for humanity.

In 2017, European researchers discovered to a potential solution. The wax butterfly larvae, commonly known as wax, have a skill to decompose polyethylene in their bodies. Waxing verses are considered a pest since ancient times because they parasitize the hives, feeding on beeswax. However, we now know that the third also spontaneously feeds on polyethylene, which has a chemically similar structure.

“About 2,000 wax worms can break down an entire polyethylene bag as little as 24 hours, although we think that co-adition with a solution as well as sugars can considerably reduce the number of worms,” ​​said Dr. Bryan Cassone, professor of Biooldy at Brandy University in Canada, in a Press release. Cassone and her team sought how these insects could be hampered to combat plastic pollution. “Underline the biological mechanisms and the consequences on the physical form associated with plastic biodagration is essential to use wax worms for large -scale plastic correction”, Heys.

In previous experiences, Cassone and his team Discovered Exactly how the wax worms break down polyethylene. To highlight their digestive mechanism, the Cassone team nourished polyethylene to wax the verses for several days and followed the metabolic processes of insects and changes in their intestinal environment. They found that when the wax worms ate polyethylene, their faces were liquidated and contained glycol as by-product.

But when the intestinal bacteria of insects have been removed by administering antibiotics, the amount of glycol in their excrement has been considerably reduced. This revealed that the decomposition of polyethylene depends on the intestinal microbes of wax worms.

The team also isolated the bacteria of guts from wax worms, then cultivated strains that survive polyethylene as the only source of food. Among them was a tension of Ainetobacterwhich survived more thanks to a year in the laboratory environment and continued to break down polyethylene. This has revealed to what extent the intestinal flora of the wax worm is robust and persistent is in its ability to decompose plastics.

However, in reality, with regard to plastic compression, intestinal bacteria do not work alone. When the researchers carried out a genetic analysis on insects, they found that the wax worms supplied with plastic had the expression of the inclined genes relating to fat metabolism, and after being nourished in plastic, the wax worms showed that Dully showed signs of having a body fat. Armed with their plastic digging intestinal bacteria, larvae can decompose plastics and convert them into lipids, which they then store in their bodies.

However, a diet only in plastic has not resulted in long -term survival of wax worms. In their last experience, the team found that wax worms that continued to eat only polyethylene diad in a few days and have lost a lot of weight. It has shown that it is difficult for wax worms to continually treat polyethylene waste. But researchers think that creating a food source to help their polyethylene intake would mean that wax worms are able to maintain healthy viability on a plastic diet and improve their decomposition efficiency.

For the future, the team suggests two strategies to use the capacity of the wax worm to consume plastics. One consists in producing wax worms that are fed with a polyethylene diet, while providing them with the nutritional support they need for long-term survival, then integrating them into the circular economy, using insects themselves to have plastic waste. The other is to rethink the degradation route of the plastic of wax worms in the laboratory, using only microorganisms and enzymes, and therefore create a means of plastic arrangement that does not need real insects.

In the path of insects, a by -product would be large lovers of insect biomass – larvae without counting that have been nourished in plastic. These could be transformed into a highly nutritional flow for the aquaculture industry, because according to data from the research team, insects could be a good source of protein for commercial fish.

This story initially looked at Cable Japan and has been translated from the Japanese.