Enzyme driven performance enhancement of laundry detergents: reducing the associated environmental burden

该项目旨在通过三个主要研究领域减少洗衣的环境负担；开发酶解决方案以延长服装的寿命；创建一种新的方法来量化塑料微纤维的释放，以及确定与纺织品相关的塑料在环境中的命运。该项目将在每个领域开发新的方法，以提高纺织业的可持续性。通过创建针对纺织品中特定区域的酶解决方案，它将允许对酶进行工程设计，使其更高效。这将通过利用新技术确定酶和纺织品表面之间的物理化学相互作用来实现，从而延长服装的寿命。通过延长服装的使用寿命，这将有助于降低消费者丢弃衣服的快速速度。在目前没有标准化协议的情况下，一种模拟全尺寸洗涤的新方法可以更准确地量化塑料微纤维的释放，行业可以使用这种方法来确定微纤维的释放率，但也可以突出释放的关键驱动因素，从而为缓解策略提供参考。在洗衣过程中释放的塑料微纤维可以大量进入环境。通过设计元基因组(大量遗传数据)分析工具来确定这些塑料材料的命运，并创建独特的协议来研究具有潜在塑料降解微生物的基质，将突出环境条件下与塑料相关的微生物群落。由此，物种可以成为酶工程的目标，例如，提高这些酶的最佳温度可能会增加高结晶聚合物的降解率。工业用的酶可以用来设计塑料回收的生物降解解决方案。

The project aims to reduce the environmental burden of laundry across three main research areas; developing enzymatic solutions to increase the longevity of clothing, creating a novel methodology to quantify the release of plastic microfibres, and determining the fate of textile associated plastic in the environment. The project will develop novel methodologies in each of these areas to improve the sustainability of the textile industry. By creating enzymatic solutions targeting specific regions within textiles it will allow enzymes to be engineered making them more efficient. This will be achieved by determining the physiochemical interactions between enzymes and the textile surface utilising novel technologies, increasing the longevity of clothing. By increasing a garments lifespan, it will help reduce the rapid rate of clothing being discarded by consumers.In the current absence of no standardised protocol, a novel methodology simulating full-scale washing that can more accurately quantify plastic microfibre release could be used by industry to determine microfibre release rates, but also highlight the key drivers of release that will inform mitigation strategies. Plastic microfibres that are released during laundry can be found entering the environment in large quantities. Determining the fate of these plastic materials by designing metagenomic (large quantities of genetic data) analysis tools and creating unique protocols for investigating substrates with potential plastic degrading microbes, will highlight the microbial community associated with plastic in environmental conditions. From this, species can be targeted for enzymatic engineering, for example increasing the temperature at which these enzymes are optimal may increase the degradation rate in highly crystalline polymers. Enzymes characterised could be used by industry to engineer biodegradation solutions to plastic recycling.