Microplastics are everywhere on earth, including the oceans. The threat they pose to marine environments and by extension to human health is no joke. So what can we do to get rid of the contamination?
Nathan Crook, an assistant professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, is working on a unique process for getting rid of microplastics: bacteria engineered to degrade polyethylene terephthalate, or PET, plastic.
Listen as Crook describes how you get a microbe to “eat” plastic, and how vanilla flavoring could be one result of the process.
This post was originally published in NC State News.
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