Serbian Scientists Experiment With Mealworms To Degrade Polystyrene (reuters.com) 60
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Serbian scientists have been experimenting with mealworms as a way to break down polystyrene. Larisa Ilijin, a principal research fellow at Belgrade's Institute for Biology, said the scientists had discovered that mealworms can digest various plastics, including polystyrene, which is used in packaging, insulation and food containers. In the project endorsed by the government and the United Nations' agency for international development, UNDP, and other international donors, they have been including the polystyrene in the regular food of the larval form of the yellow mealworm beetle, or Tenebrio molitor.
They habitually eat more or less anything, but need the training to eat the plastic products. "We have larvae that have been adapted over a long time to biodegrade plastic, to be as efficient as possible in the process," Ilijin told Reuters. She said the bacteria living in their guts break down the plastic into carbon dioxide and water, and showed no evidence of leaving microplastic residue in their innards or faeces. The work builds on similar research projects in the U.S. and Africa. [...]
The institute has given Belgrade-based Belinda Animals several containers of the mealworms. It is now breeding them and hoping to attract a network of similar farms. "When breaking down 1 kg of Styrofoam, larvae emit one to two grams of carbon dioxide ... If we incinerate it ... (Styrofoam) emits over 4,000 times more," owner Boris Vasiljev said. He also envisages the larvae being used as animal feed, should it reach a large commercial scale. The use of mealworms is still in its infancy, Ilijin said, as Serbia still needs to adopt regulations that would allow the use and sale of insect products for animal fodder. "Styrofoam takes over 500 years to decompose in nature ... this would be one of the good ways for solving the problem of plastic waste in nature," Ilijin said.
They habitually eat more or less anything, but need the training to eat the plastic products. "We have larvae that have been adapted over a long time to biodegrade plastic, to be as efficient as possible in the process," Ilijin told Reuters. She said the bacteria living in their guts break down the plastic into carbon dioxide and water, and showed no evidence of leaving microplastic residue in their innards or faeces. The work builds on similar research projects in the U.S. and Africa. [...]
The institute has given Belgrade-based Belinda Animals several containers of the mealworms. It is now breeding them and hoping to attract a network of similar farms. "When breaking down 1 kg of Styrofoam, larvae emit one to two grams of carbon dioxide ... If we incinerate it ... (Styrofoam) emits over 4,000 times more," owner Boris Vasiljev said. He also envisages the larvae being used as animal feed, should it reach a large commercial scale. The use of mealworms is still in its infancy, Ilijin said, as Serbia still needs to adopt regulations that would allow the use and sale of insect products for animal fodder. "Styrofoam takes over 500 years to decompose in nature ... this would be one of the good ways for solving the problem of plastic waste in nature," Ilijin said.
I threw away polystyrene today. (Score:2)
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I have polystyrene insulation in my walls. I sure hope it lasts a long time!
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I have polystyrene insulation in my walls. I sure hope it lasts a long time!
RV or pallet shack? Got your fire insurance up to date? Signed your last will and testament?
Re:I threw away polystyrene today. (Score:5, Informative)
Polystyrene is just hydrocarbon chains, it can be turned into syngas in a waste-to-energy gasification. While technically it can be burned in a incinerator it tends to need a higher temperature than most waste-to-energy systems to avoid creating lots of soot to deal with, or added slowly in a small amount compared to other inputs.
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You can dissolve polystyrene in gasoline to make hillbilly napalm.
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You can dissolve polystyrene in gasoline to make hillbilly napalm.
This can be done, but nobody should try this at home. It might not produce the same kind of fire and fume hazard as polysytrene and gasoline separately but by being a flammable sticky mess it can cause all kinds of new hazards when mixed together.
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You can dissolve polystyrene in gasoline to make hillbilly napalm.
We also use polystyrene dissolved in acetone to make component dope for coils in electronics.
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You can dissolve polystyrene in gasoline to make hillbilly napalm.
We also use polystyrene dissolved in acetone to make component dope for coils in electronics.
Ah, memories. I love the smell of Q-Dope in the morning...
BTW, are you still using Q-Dope for any modern manufacturing or other projects? The last time I even saw a bottle would be more than forty years ago. Colectro or GC Electronics brand, IIRC.
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You can dissolve polystyrene in gasoline to make hillbilly napalm.
We also use polystyrene dissolved in acetone to make component dope for coils in electronics.
Ah, memories. I love the smell of Q-Dope in the morning...
BTW, are you still using Q-Dope for any modern manufacturing or other projects? The last time I even saw a bottle would be more than forty years ago. Colectro or GC Electronics brand, IIRC.
And that brings back memories as well. I used GC "glyptol" a strange red goop with a certain smell. Yeah, it instantly brings back memories. Apparently called Corona Dope now. The MSDS is scary, https://www.gcelectronics.com/... [gcelectronics.com] but for the few drops we used, I kinda doubt it's worse than using a Sharpie. Don't huff the stuff kids! 8^) They also make a clear version that only uses toluene with the insulation material.
I use the home made stuff now when winding coils and toroids. No need for the corona d
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Glyptal - that's another ancient memory. Fresh out of school I worked for a division of GE which had repair contracts with Canada's DND. I repaired radar and nav equipment, a LOT of which was still vacuum-tube based and had wire and cable bundles bound with lacing cord. Along with locking nuts and bolts in place, I recall Glyptal being applied to the loose ends of the lacing cord. IIRC, I just used a soldering iron to melt them instead.
Good times, except when I forgot to turn off the 400 VDC B+ supply on a
Re: Put my left hand on that nice solid aluminum c (Score:2)
That 'sparked' a couple of my old memories.
Made me laugh.
Kids these days don't know what they are missing.
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I remember learning this fact from the Anarchist's Cookbook when I was in high school although I think it lacked the "hillbilly napalm" title that I'm enjoying in your post right now.
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When I was twelve, my mom asked me what I wanted for Christmas, so I told her I wanted the Anarchist's Cookbook.
I have no idea where she got it, but it was under the tree on Christmas morning.
I loved that book. I read every page at least five times.
Most of the electronics information is way out of date, but the rest is still good.
I had my kids read it too, and we did some projects together. It was a great father-child experience.
Soot is good (Score:2)
It means less of the carbon is being combusted to produce CO2 and more of the energy is coming from the reacting the hydrogen in the compound to create water. The soot can be collected and dumped on the land instead of into the air.
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I think it was packed with an air conditioner that my room mate ordered. I have used some of it as insulation. It seems like there are better uses for it than to just pack it to ship something. I like the idea of using popcorn to pack things in. It is what it is and I have no control. If there are some bugs that can eat it... cool. I have heard that before, but it seems like once Polystyrene, always Polystyrene, if I use it or throw it away or whatever.
Another alternative is "Cheetos". Corn or wheat (could be just about anything that contains starch) that is run through one of the extruders used to make snacks, only not flavored.
The resulting product is actually edible. Though without the cheese and salt, kinda bland.
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Another alternative is "Cheetos". Corn or wheat (could be just about anything that contains starch) that is run through one of the extruders used to make snacks, only not flavored.
The resulting product is actually edible. Though without the cheese and salt, kinda bland.
It's edible for some values of the word "edible". It has no crunch so it just turns into a sticky mass. But you CAN use saliva - or just water if you want to be boring - to glue them to each other in long snake-like chains. Not that I've ever done that... ;~}
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Another alternative is "Cheetos". Corn or wheat (could be just about anything that contains starch) that is run through one of the extruders used to make snacks, only not flavored.
The resulting product is actually edible. Though without the cheese and salt, kinda bland.
It's edible for some values of the word "edible". It has no crunch so it just turns into a sticky mass. But you CAN use saliva - or just water if you want to be boring - to glue them to each other in long snake-like chains. Not that I've ever done that... ;~}
True dat. It's pretty stale stuff. Maybe in some post apocalyptic world it would be of some use. I first learned about it when a co-worker nonchalantly popped one in his mouth. I reacted with "WTH is wrong with you?" He told me it was corn extruded through a cereal extruder, so I had to try one. Very little to recommend it.
I'm confused (Score:2)
They say 1kg of polystyrene burns to produce 4kg of CO2
They then say 1kg of polystyrene only emits 1g of CO2 when the bacteria in the worms break it down.
But they break it down into water and CO2.
Burning does the exact same thing, breaks it down into water and CO2
Where did all the CO2 go?
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I suspect they are not metabolizing it completely. In fact, I bet the worm tailings are actually only 25% decomposed, so it's not really a solution yet. But promising I guess.
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The only way to solve the CO2 issue is to not manufacture polystyrene.
But if you did happen to make some and you don't want it clogging up your rivers or joining the ocean garbage patch, then you should break it down some how. Mealworms could be a very low effort solution that scales better than building incinerators and then attempting to ship unwanted polystyrene around to a central location.
I imagine if you built a few simple shacks at the municipal dump and just shoveled polystyrene into some bins once
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If you burn it, you can capture the energy. Must like a coal or gas power station.
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Mealworms could be a very low effort solution that scales better than building incinerators and then attempting to ship unwanted polystyrene around to a central location.
But if the ultimate CO2 release is identical - as it must be - wouldn't it be better to just burn the stuff and recover the energy locked into it? Assuming, of course, that there's a safe way to deal with the toxic products of combustion.
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As the meal worms multiply due to the abundant food the extra population can be used for high protein animal feed as well.
People can eat them too but Western countries are generally pretty funny about eating bugs so the animal feed would be an easier sell.
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Surely it goes to build the bacteria? They’re consuming the polystyrene as a food source, so they’re using the components to make sugars, starches, lipids and proteins.
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In a steady state process, the bacteria will be dying and decaying as quickly as they are regenerating.
There will be no net accumulation of carbon.
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You missed the real problem. 1 kg of polysterene CANNOT become 4kg of Carbon Dioxide.
Carbon weighs 12. Oxygen weighs 16. (Atomic Weights from Periodic Table). Carbon dixoide = 1 carbon plus 2 oxygen.
Assuming the 1kg was 100% Carbon, that means that you are adding 2 kg /12 * 16 of oxygen = 8/3 kg = 2 2/3 kg of weight. 1 kg of carbon + 2 2/3 oxygen = 3 and 2/3 kg of weight
1 kg of polysterene at worst can become 3.66 kg of carbon dioxide. But Polysteren is not pure carbon. It is half carbon and half Hyd
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They did get it a little wrong.
Looks like the factor to convert carbon to CO2 is 3.664
Polystyrene is 92% carbon
1kg polystyrene -> 3.37kg CO2
They rounded it up to 4 I guess
hello, plastic-eating bacteria (Score:2)
love it.
i do wonder if there's a risk/boon of those grub-gastro-bacteria evolving their way out of the grub-gastro's and becoming viable in the world at large and chomping on all the awesome plastics we have around.
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From what I gathered from the fine article the bacteria already existed in nature, they simply got it concentrated to where the mealworms could live on a diet consisting mostly of polystyrene. In the aftermath of the oil spill from the Deepwater Horizon explosion there was something of a discovery on naturally occurring bacteria that would feed off petroleum, and so a lot of work cleaning up that mess was from natural processes. In hindsight this should not have been all that surprising, it's been known f
Re: hello, plastic-eating bacteria (Score:2)
interesting, thanks.
i have more questions but i should read the details myself. and i guess polystyrene is different than all plastics, so my wondering was a little off.
If reliable, it could also feed us (Score:4, Interesting)
Mealworms are a potential human protein source, see https://medium.com/signals-of-... [medium.com] .. if we can recycle plastics *and* feed people, what's not to like? (Other than eating mealworms.. bug we can/should get over that).
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Mealworms can also be used as chicken feed.
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Mealworms can also be used as chicken feed.
We use a lot of them in our backyard bluebird feeder. Birds love those things. Good protein, and don't smell bad.
But with the present day paradigm that all plastics are bad, is it really a good idea to purposely inject them into life-forms? I thought that plastic kills fish, can easily get past the blood brain barrier, and cause dementia and horrid problems in life forms. So we're told.
It seems to me that for the length of time we've had metro-plastics there should be some data on the claims, that shou
Re: potential human protein source (Score:2)
Fry them up, spice them up, then bag them up.
Sounds like they will be a healthier option for cheetoh's with only a little more plastic in them.
What can possibly go wrong? (Score:2)
Once out of the lab, these bacteria will eat all PS they come across. Building insulation will become their favorite feedstuff, and we will struggle to keep our houses insulated. Better to use PS to produce syngas in a controlled environment. To think we could ever control bacteria is a dangerous illusion.
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The only bacteria here is in their guts and and gut bacteria typically doesnt prosper and spread outside that. You definitely wouldnt find it growing in your insulation.
What about the oceans filled with plastic? (Score:1)
Would be great if you could transfer this bacteria to plankton! That way we could get rid of a lot of the polystyrene in the oceans. Might be possible to do that with other plastic types also?
Not fit to be called a scientist. (Score:1)
She said the bacteria living in their guts break down the plastic into carbon dioxide.
So turn it into something thats causing climate breakdown.
Thats not science thats ineptitude.
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Whether or not something is bad for the environment has nothing to do with whether or not it is science. Also, the environment/climate will do just fine with heaps of CO2 and rising sea levels. Whether particular species (such has humans) do okay, is a different story. CO2 does not cause climate 'breakdown', it encourages climate change. I'm not sure what it would mean for the climate to 'break down'.
The question that matters here is what is worse for the environment (in terms of human-preferred environment
Um, yeah, no (Score:2)
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I'd prefer y'all not engineer a bunch of stuff that will want to eat my plastic products.
I'd love for those who are hand-wringing about plastic to suggest an environmentally acceptable alternative.
Glass or metal? Energy intensive. Wax or regular paper? Killing trees, and more petroleum products. It will be a hard sell to get people on board with the only solution I can think of, which is for humans to return to hunter gatherer days, Eat what you kill that day, wear its pelt as your clothing, and no technology.
Anyone want to chime in with the palatable solution?
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Right now the thing to do is to look for ways to reduce plastic use until we find something better as you are correct that eliminating it isn't practical right now. There are lots of areas where we could use less plastic or just use other materials, lots of stuff over the years that used to come in cardboard or waxed cardboard have switched to plastic and could be transitioned back easily. Given that paper and cardboard are generally sourced from rotational clear cutting operations where they replant fast g
You will eat the plastic-filled bugs (Score:2)
Sallymanders? (Score:2)
Disappointed as usual with the lack of Funny on Slashdot, but I confess the Subject is the only thing I can think of in relation to mealworms.