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轻洗衣的环境负担；开发酶解方案以延长衣服的使用寿命，创造一种新的方法来量化塑料微纤维的释放，并确定纺织相关塑料在环境中的命运。该项目将在这些领域开发新的方法，以提高纺织工业的可持续性。通过创造针对纺织品中特定区域的酶解决方案，它将允许酶被改造，使其更有效。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，从而延长衣服的使用寿命。通过延长服装的使用寿命，它将有助于降低消费者丢弃衣物的速度。在目前没有标准化协议的情况下，一种模拟全面洗涤的新方法可以更准确地量化塑料微纤维的释放，可被工业界用来确定微纤维的释放率，但也强调了释放的关键驱动因素，这将为缓解战略提供信息。洗衣过程中释放的塑料微纤维会大量进入环境。通过设计宏基因组（大量遗传数据）分析工具和创建独特的方案来研究潜在塑料降解微生物的基质，确定这些塑料材料的命运，将突出与环境条件下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提高高结晶聚合物的降解率。酶可以被工业用于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.