this post was submitted on 17 May 2025
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top 37 comments
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[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 hours ago

Could we consider this to be a dilemma of preservation?

Let’s take something innocuous and specific, like a package of food. We want it to be airtight and safe from bacteria until a human tears it open and eats it. But once torn open, we want it to disintegrate.

Now, if we make this bacteria and allow it to spread, the same problem exists as if we were to package that food in a wooden container, or a paper container. The material is now “weak” to ambient attackers.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 hours ago

A moment of silence for people with plastic surgery

[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 hours ago
[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 hours ago

How does it deal with the post digestion stuff?

[–] [email protected] 24 points 10 hours ago

Bunch of people in Hollywood getting really nervous right now.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

yo thats unironically based. we need that.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 hours ago* (last edited 1 hour ago)

If we could get it to stay in like the ocean or something then maybe that would be okay.

This could compromise the integrity of countless structures including the vast majority of pipes, electrical, and electronics and prevent us from using plastic as an inert substance to store highly reactive substances, and also storing food and drinks.

[–] [email protected] 73 points 15 hours ago* (last edited 15 hours ago) (3 children)

What does it excrete? I’m curious.

Edit: The bacterium will eventually convert the plastic into carbon dioxide and water. That’s both expected and somewhat disappointing.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2016/03/10/469972237/this-plastic-eating-bacterium-might-help-deal-with-waste-one-day

[–] [email protected] 28 points 11 hours ago

You'd prefer they excreted gasoline and matches?

[–] [email protected] 13 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

what the plastic is made of. so any molecule that contains C, H (and atoms like O and S F or N depending on the type of plastic) can be synthesized by plastic eating bacteria. so we can also make oil and fuel from it

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 hours ago* (last edited 9 hours ago)

The article states it’s ingesting Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET), (C10H8O4)n

[–] [email protected] 35 points 14 hours ago (3 children)

Metabolism is just fire but slower IIRC

[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

Metabolism can definitely create useful products. Alcohol is formed from yeast metabolising sugars, for example. Same with miso paste. Hell, we can make milk without cows now via precise fermantation.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 hours ago (2 children)

Now that is interesting. From what and how?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 hours ago

Not sure on what the inputs are, but basically bioreactors that have bacteria that are doing the same processes you'd get milk from otherwise. I've done ice cream and protein powder made from companies that used perfect day foods' reactor milk. Actually was a big fan of the vegan whey protein powder, but that company died at some point

[–] [email protected] 5 points 5 hours ago

Water and evaporated milk

[–] [email protected] 7 points 13 hours ago

True, but it also depends on the enzymes capabilities to break things down into their smallest components.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 12 hours ago (3 children)

If I ever become a rapper I'll be known as slow fire

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 hours ago

That would be a great name for a jazz band, I think

[–] [email protected] 3 points 12 hours ago

I'll be known as Metabolism.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 hours ago

He's not a rapper.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 14 hours ago (2 children)

This is so great and so bad at the same time. We're gonna have to go back to using tar and shit for things we actually want to last. That's not going to be cheap...

[–] [email protected] 28 points 13 hours ago (2 children)

I mean, wood already biodegrades quite readily, yet we are able to make some pretty long lasting things out of it anyway. Having a bacteria that can break down some variety of plastic doesn't really imply that all plastic things are going to rot away like old fruit.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

We also cover wood in hydrocarbons to stop it from being broken down, if a bacteria can break down long hydrocarbon chains we are kind of fucked

[–] [email protected] 0 points 3 hours ago

Dry wood will last centuries without any oiling. Which is good news for timber frames because those are left untreated. As long as your house is water-tight, the frame will be fine because wood rot simlly can't metabolize in typical indoors humidity evels.

What we typically protect wood from is water, mechanical wear, UV, and stains. But even a furniture piece will not always get treated on internal parts where wear and wood expansion are no concerns.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 4 hours ago

Is this a false equivalence?

Is the rate at which wood rots indicative of how quickly plastic would rot?

Also plastic tends to be very thin. Like if bacteria can denature 0.1mm per year that's lots of years for a timber beam but a few months for plastic packaging.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 hours ago

Tar is very problematic health-wise. Banned in some countries for this reason.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 15 hours ago (3 children)

Aren't all humans full of microplastics?

[–] [email protected] 32 points 15 hours ago (2 children)

All humans are also full of bacteria

[–] [email protected] 19 points 15 hours ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 19 points 15 hours ago (1 children)

Wait. It's just bacteria and microplastics all the way down?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 14 hours ago

yin and yang.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 13 hours ago

Don't forget PFAS

[–] [email protected] 6 points 13 hours ago

Not just humans, IIRC micro plastics can be found in the most remote parts of the planet such as uninhabited areas of Antarctica.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 13 hours ago

Everything is, it has saturated the water cycle and is everywhere the water cycle reaches. (water cycle reaches everywhere)

[–] [email protected] 8 points 14 hours ago
[–] [email protected] 5 points 15 hours ago

If we play our cards right, we could have a real-life Andromeda Strain.