Bug helps to attack polystyrene

[Urban Ranger]

There might be hope to mountains of "white terror" yet:

Kevin O’Connor of University College Dublin and his colleagues heated polystyrene foam, the generic name for Styrofoam, to convert it to styrene oil. The natural form of styrene is in real peanuts, strawberries and a good steak. A synthetic form is used in car parts and electronic components.

Anyway, the scientists fed this styrene oil to the soil bacteria Pseudomonas putida, which converted it into biodegradable plastic known as PHA (polyhydroxyalkanoates).

PHA can be used to make plastic forks and packaging film. It is resistant to heat, grease and oil. It also lasts a long time. But unlike Styrofoam, PHA biodegrades in soil and water.

Getting closer, but we're not there yet. Biodegradable means the plastic breaks down into smaller parts that won't take up as much room, but it still doesn't mean these smaller chains become part of the large "recycling cycles" in the biosphere.

[Japher]

you scared me

polystyrene is the most common plastic for use in test tubes

a bug destroying it would suck!

big time!

anyway, nice discovery

[Provost Harrison]

PHAs have been known about and used for what must be over a decade now. Definitely old news

[Spiffor]

Polystyrene is extremely useful in construction. A bug eating it uncontrollably would suck (though it would save much time for the janitor)

[Az]

Polystyrene is a 100% recycleable thermoplastic. no need to do this ****.

[Spec]

Originally posted by Az
Polystyrene is a 100% recycleable thermoplastic. no need to do this ****.

True, but most people throw it away instead of recycling it...


Spec.

[Az]

so? you'll have to have proper procedures at the recycling center for picking that stuff out of the general **** anyhow, for proceeding with this "biodegradable" ****. Might as well simply recycle it by reheating and remolding.

[DaShi]

There goes my dream of polystyrene mobile combat units.

[Japher]

Go with polypropylene, much more flexible with the same rigidness

[duke o' york]

Originally posted by DaShi
There goes my dream of polystyrene mobile combat units.

Ha! Get back to your evil drawing board in the undersea lair.
We didn't even have to get Chuck Norris or the A Team on your ass this time round, so you'd better be ready the next time you think of taking over the world with your army of superpowered plastic automatons.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Az
so? you'll have to have proper procedures at the recycling center for picking that stuff out of the general **** anyhow, for proceeding with this "biodegradable" ****. Might as well simply recycle it by reheating and remolding.

Cost, Az, cost.

[The Mad Monk]

Is quite low, or it wouldn't be such a popular material.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by The Mad Monk
Is quite low, or it wouldn't be such a popular material.

Um, cost of recycling the material vs cost of making it from scratch (raw material). Maybe if the crude oil price stays high there will be a higher incentive of recycling.

I also think a lot of stuff is overpackaged. If they can ship HDDs in anti-static bags without individual packing you can do that to just about anything.

[The Mad Monk]

I shop at Newegg. No individual packaging, but a helluva lot of peanuts.