Share The Seeds

Gardening Area => The Eco-Garden => Topic started by: elstongunn39 on August 06, 2014, 04:03:27 PM

Title: fungi that digests plastic
Post by: elstongunn39 on August 06, 2014, 04:03:27 PM
http://www.fastcoexist.com/1679201/fungi-discovered-in-the-amazon-will-eat-your-plastic

Fungi really are the panacea!
Title: Re: fungi that digests plastic
Post by: Ian Morris on August 06, 2014, 05:55:31 PM
This is really awesome.

Imagine the flush of mushrooms from an entire landfill inoculated and cased with a layer of turf.  I wonder the mechanism by which the plastic is broken down?  If it is reduced to some of the hydrocarbon components it might also serve as a fuel source, albeit a likely dirty one.  Really fascinating stuff.

Bio-remediation is the way to go.

-Ian
Title: Re: fungi that digests plastic
Post by: BubbleCat on August 19, 2014, 05:50:07 AM
And imagine how confused this world would be if they escaped that landfill :D

I remember there was a project engineering micoorganisms that were meant to do exactly that, eat plastic. They did report some sucess a while ago.
Title: Re: fungi that digests plastic
Post by: TBM on August 19, 2014, 06:59:20 AM
If it can survive in the ocean then there's your fix for the Great Pacific Garbage Patch 8) Maybe research should be done towards that goal...
Title: Re: fungi that digests plastic
Post by: BubbleCat on August 19, 2014, 07:53:30 AM
And also on the effects, just because the junk isnt present in its current form anymore, it could always lead to follow up problems upon breakdown. The least would be fungal overcrowding of the big vortexes in the oceans :D
Title: Re: fungi that digests plastic
Post by: 23 on August 19, 2014, 02:01:49 PM
yeah like the simpsons episode where springfield gets invaded by lizards and they use snakes to kill them and after a while they end up havinga gorilla problem but no its very fascinating