Biocatalysis by plastic-degrading enzymes for bioremediation and recycling

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Microplastic contamination presents an urgent environmental problem. Biocatalytic degradation of microplastics would be a 'green'remediation technology, but enzymes that destroy the unreactive plastics such as PET are rare - and currently inefficient. Ourultrahigh-throughput screening of metagenomic libraries using innovative microfluidic technologies has helped to identify a newfamily of enzymes that is able to break down microplastics. We also have invented the first direct assay for particle breakdown thatallows directed evolution of plastic degrading enzymes: uniquely tailor-making catalysts for microplastics breakdown becomepossible. We now want to explore real world application for our workflow and its outcomes. This project is designed to analysemarkets and IP landscape for commercializing (i) polymer degrading enzymes generated thus far; (ii) the microfluidic devices used forcatalyst selection based on polymer particle-scatter. Interactions with stakeholders in industry (recycling) and also in the public sector(bioremediation) will help us to define the target markets and their different demands. Limited experimental work is proposed toextend our results to create an industrially relevant set of showcase results and for expanding the scope of our ultrahigh-throughputassay to particle degradation of other plastic materials in the environment to demonstrate versatility. At the end of the project we willbe in a position to rank and evaluate different business models ranging from a spin-out company (including a draft business plan) tolicensing or direct industrial collaboration and consulting.