Engineering enzymes for the deconstruction of waste polyester textiles

用于废旧聚酯纺织品解构的工程酶

• 批准号: 2893469
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University of Portsmouth
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Studentship
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2023 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=studentship-2893469
• 关键词: Engineering; enzymes; deconstruction; waste; polyester

Novel means of recycling end-of-life polyesters are required if we are to convert the current, linear textile economy into a circular one with a reduced reliance on fossil-based feedstocks.Natural polymers are commonplace in all kingdoms of life, and for every natural polymer, there exists a natural enzyme that can deconstruct it back into its constituent building blocks. These deconstructing enzymes give circularity to life; the building blocks are reused with nothing going to waste. This project will develop enzyme-based technology for the breakdown of waste polyester textiles into their chemical building blocks for subsequent reuse in a circular bioeconomy. We will develop robust enzymes that can deconstruct the most commonly-used polyester polyethylene terephthalate (PET) in waste textiles, tolerating the challenges that this feedstock poses, namely its toughness and the presence of dyes and additives. The research will establish the feasibility of using enzymes to deconstruct the PET in waste textiles into a soup of simple building blocks for conversion back into new polyesters, thus circularising the existing linear economy, and reducing the need to produce virgin PET from oil and gas.This studentship opportunity would particularly suit someone with a background in biochemistry, biotechnology, biophysics or organic chemistry. All necessary training will be provided, including in enzyme engineering, microbial enzyme expression, fermentation, chromatography, biocalorimetry, chemical analysis and bioreactor-based PET depolymerisation. The project will be supervised by Prof Andy Pickford, Director of the Centre for Enzyme Innovation (CEI) at the University of Portsmouth, and Prof Tobias von der Haar, University of Kent. The CEI combines state-of-the-art facilities and world-leading expertise to not only drive forward scientific breakthroughs, but also provide the capacity and capability for translating that new knowledge into real-world solutions. For more information about our science, please visit the CEI webpage at: www.port.ac.uk/cei

如果我们要将目前的线性纺织经济转变为循环经济，减少对化石原料的依赖，就需要回收使用寿命结束时聚酯的新方法。天然聚合物在所有生命王国中都很常见，对于每一种天然聚合物，都有一种天然酶可以将其分解成其组成部分。这些解构酶赋予生命循环；构建块被重复使用，不会浪费任何东西。该项目将开发基于酶的技术，将废弃的涤纶纺织品分解成它们的化学构件，以便随后在循环生物经济中重复使用。我们将开发强大的酶，可以分解废旧纺织品中最常用的聚酯聚对苯二甲酸乙二醇酯(PET)，耐受这种原料带来的挑战，即它的韧性以及染料和添加剂的存在。这项研究将确定使用酶将废旧纺织品中的PET分解成一汤简单的积木，然后再转化为新聚酯的可行性，从而使现有的线性经济循环起来，并减少从石油和天然气中生产原始PET的需要。这个学生机会特别适合具有生物化学、生物技术、生物物理学或有机化学背景的人。将提供所有必要的培训，包括酶工程、微生物酶表达、发酵、层析、生物量热、化学分析和基于生物反应器的PET解聚。该项目将由朴茨茅斯大学酶创新中心(CEI)主任安迪·皮克福德教授和肯特大学托拜厄斯·冯德哈尔教授监督。CEI结合了最先进的设施和世界领先的专业知识，不仅推动了科学突破，还提供了将这些新知识转化为现实世界解决方案的能力和能力。欲了解更多有关我们科学的信息，请访问CEI的网页：www.port.ac.uk/cei