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24 kwi 2024 · Letting these worms loose in a plastic-polluted environment could be dangerous to ecosystems, especially given their ability to destroy bees' hives, as Bertocchini notes.
24 kwi 2017 · But a team of European scientists may have found a unique solution to the plastic problem. They discovered that a common insect can chew sizable holes in a plastic shopping bag within 40...
7 paź 2022 · Wax worms, or moth larvae that live in the honeycombs of beehives, have two enzymes in their saliva that break down the plastic at room temperature within just a few hours, according to the...
26 kwi 2017 · Bertocchini and colleagues from Cambridge University began studying the creatures and found that the common wax worm can not only munch but also metabolize polyethylene, the plastic in shopping...
4 paź 2022 · Wax worms could provide a new way to combat the plastic pollution crisis. European researchers have found that the saliva of wax moth larvae is capable of breaking down the most common type of plastic, polyethylene. They identified two enzymes that can break apart the plastic's long polymers into smaller chains.
Researchers have identified a pair of enzymes in wax worm saliva that naturally break down a common form of plastic within a few hours at room temperature.
Wax worm enzymes can oxidise plastic within hours, kick-starting the degradation process. It is hoped that by producing the enzymes on an industrial scale, new environmentally-friendly...
