Home

Search History

Clear History

Hot Searches

Change

Subscribe eNews

Once A Week Once Every Two Weeks

Applications

EREMA to show high-quality recycling solutions at CHINAPLAS 2026

ENGEL’s high-performance automotive solutions at CHINAPLAS 2026

ST BlowMoulding to unveil multiple innovative hollow moulding solutions at CHINAPLAS 2026

Products

Chambroad to highlight specialization and innovation at CHINAPLAS 2026

Evonik displays its latest solutions at CHINAPLAS 2026

Kistler’s cavity pressure sensor for injection molding trainings

Activities

CHINAPLAS 2026：VDMA “The Power of Plastics” forum highlights digitalization and circularity
Must-attend: CHINAPLAS x CPRJ Plastics Recycling and Circular Economy Conference in Shanghai
Beyond procurement: Exploring the concurrent events at CHINAPLAS 2026

Pictorial

Webinars

[Mandarin] Covestro: Innovative thermal conductive material solution for new-generation network devices

[Mandarin] Covestro: The Material Effect: Empowering Innovations in Solar-Storage-Charging Smart Energy and Data Center Applications

[Mandarin] Covestro: The Material Effect Amids the Humanoid Robot Development Surge

Conferences

14th Edition CPRJ Plastics in Packaging Conference and Showcase

7th Edition CHINAPLAS x CPRJ Plastics Recycling and Circular Economy Conference and Showcase

swop x CPRJ The Digital and Intelligent Carbon Reduction Revolution in Plastic Packaging — From Material Innovation to Circular Ecosystem

Industry Topic

ASEAN: The Next Manufacturing Hub

Innovative and Sustainable Packaging

Green Plastics: News & Insights

CHINAPLAS

CHINAPLAS 2026 Focus

CHINAPLAS 2025 Focus

CHINAPLAS 2024 Focus

Exhibition Topic

K Focus

CHINA INSIGHT

Fakuma 2024 Highlights

News Videos

Ready for CHINAPLAS 2026? Two tools for your visit

Interview: Ada Leung, General Manager, Adsale Exhibition Services Ltd.

KUMHO-SUNNY: Your selection logic is already outdated!

Conference Videos

[Mandarin session: Highlights] Covestro: Innovative thermal conductive material solution for new-generation network devices

[Mandarin session: Highlights] Covestro: The Material Effect: Empowering Innovations in Solar-Storage-Charging Smart Energy and Data Center Applications

[Mandarin session: Highlights] Covestro: In-mold Coating (DC/IMC) Technology - Facilitating Personalized Design for Automotive Interior and Exterior Components

Corporate/Product Videos

About Dow

B Series brush machine

Innovative PVC Compounds for Global Manufacturing | Visit Us Booth 6.2A 39 at CHINAPLAS

Exhibition

Live CHINAPLAS Live 2026

Playback TECHHUB 2025@CPRJ Live Streaming for CHINAPLAS

Playback TECHHUB@CPRJ Live Streaming for CHINAPLAS

Events

Reservation 7th Edition CHINAPLAS x CPRJ Plastics Recycling and Circular Economy Conference and Showcase

Playback On April 14, the "6th Edition CHINAPLAS x CPRJ Plastics Recycling and Circular Economy Conference and Showcase" at the Crowne Plaza Shenzhen Nanshan is currently being livestreamed!

Playback 5th Edition CHINAPLAS x CPRJ Plastics Recycling and Circular Economy Conference and Showcase

News

Events

SPE Asia

Special

Live

eNews

Essential Guide

Event Calendar

Survey

CHINA INSIGHT

Comment
(0)

Home > News > Recycling

Discovery: Plastic-eating enzyme breaks down PET in as little as 24 hours

Source：Adsale Plastics Network Date ：2022-05-13 Editor ：JK

An enzyme variant created by engineers and scientists at The University of Texas at Austin can break down environment-throttling plastics, which typically take centuries to degrade, in just a matter of hours to days.

This discovery, published in Nature, could help solve one of the world’s most pressing environmental problems: what to do with the billions of tons of plastic waste piling up in landfills and polluting our natural lands and water.

The enzyme has the potential to supercharge recycling on a large scale that would allow major industries to reduce their environmental impact by recovering and reusing plastics at the molecular level.

“The possibilities are endless across industries to leverage this leading-edge recycling process,” said Hal Alper, professor in the McKetta Department of Chemical Engineering at UT Austin. “Beyond the obvious waste management industry, this also provides corporations from every sector the opportunity to take a lead in recycling their products.”

The project focuses on polyethylene terephthalate (PET), a significant polymer found in most consumer packaging, including cookie containers, soda bottles, fruit and salad packaging, and certain fibers and textiles. It makes up 12% of all global waste.

The newly created enzyme breaks down plastic packaging within days.

The enzyme was able to complete a “circular process” of breaking down the plastic into smaller parts (depolymerization) and then chemically putting it back together (repolymerization). In some cases, these plastics can be fully broken down to monomers in as little as 24 hours.

Researchers at the Cockrell School of Engineering and College of Natural Sciences used a machine learning model to generate novel mutations to a natural enzyme called PETase that allows bacteria to degrade PET plastics. The model predicts which mutations in these enzymes would accomplish the goal of quickly depolymerizing post-consumer waste plastic at low temperatures.

Through this process, which included studying 51 different post-consumer plastic containers, five different polyester fibers and fabrics and water bottles all made from PET, the researchers proved the effectiveness of the enzyme, which they are calling FAST-PETase (functional, active, stable and tolerant PETase).

“This work really demonstrates the power of bringing together different disciplines, from synthetic biology to chemical engineering to artificial intelligence,” stated Andrew Ellington, professor in the Center for Systems and Synthetic Biology whose team led the development of the machine learning model.

Recycling is the most obvious way to cut down on plastic waste. But globally, less than 10% of all plastic has been recycled. The most common method for disposing of plastic, besides throwing it in a landfill, is to burn it, which is costly, energy intensive and spews noxious gas into the air. Other alternative industrial processes include very energy-intensive processes of glycolysis, pyrolysis, and/or methanolysis.

Biological solutions take much less energy. Research on enzymes for plastic recycling has advanced during the past 15 years. However, until now, no one had been able to figure out how to make enzymes that could operate efficiently at low temperatures to make them both portable and affordable at large industrial scale. FAST-PETase can perform the process at less than 50 degrees Celsius.

Up next, the team plans to work on scaling up enzyme production to prepare for industrial and environmental application. The researchers have filed a patent application for the technology and are eying several different uses.

Cleaning up landfills and greening high waste-producing industries are the most obvious. But another key potential use is environmental remediation. The team is looking at a number of ways to get the enzymes out into the field to clean up polluted sites.