Synthetic plastics present in everyday materials constitute the main anthropogenic debris
entering the Earth's oceans. The oceans provide important and valuable resources such as …

Abstract Approximately 4.8–12.7 million tons of plastic waste has been estimated to be
discharged into marine environments annually by wind and river currents. The Ellen …

Widespread studies on the biodegradation of plastics have been carried out in order to
overcome the environmental problems associated with synthetic plastic waste. Recent work …

Only two polyethylene glycol terephthalate (PET)-degrading enzymes have been reported,
and their mechanism for the biochemical degradation of PET remains unclear. To identify a …

Polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs) are biopolyesters composed of hydroxy fatty acids, which
represent a complex class of storage polyesters. They are synthesized by a wide range of …

With more and more plastics being employed in human lives and increasing pressure being
placed on capacities available for plastic waste disposal, the need for biodegradable …

Synthetic plastics derived from fossil fuels—such as polyethylene, polypropylene, polyvinyl
chloride, and polystyrene—are non-degradable. A large amount of plastic waste enters …

▪ Abstract Polyesters such as poly (3-hydroxybutyrate)(PHB) or other polyhydroxyalkanoates
(PHA) have attracted commercial and academic interest as new biodegradable materials …

A thermostable enzyme PET2, found in a metagenome library, has been engineered to
improve its hydrolytic activity against polyethylene terephthalate (PET). The PET2 wild-type …

Prokaryotes synthesize a wide range of different polyhydroxyalkanoic acids (PHA) and
accumulate these polyesters as insoluble inclusions in the cytoplasm for storage of carbon …