The ProPla project

Proper waste management represents one of the most pressing challenges of the 21st century and plays a key role in sustainable development. Unsustainable use and disposal of plastics are causing persistent and widespread environmental contamination, in particular due to microplastics (MPs, 1 to < 1000 μm particles) - resulting from larger plastic - that may cause adverse effects in ecosystems and organisms.

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The project addresses the problem of MPs focusing on their recovery and valorization through a pre-competitive, multidisciplinary, and interdisciplinary approach. ProPla aims to develop an innovative biotechnological application to recover PET microplastics (microPET) from wastewater and exploit the power of protein engineering and systems biology approaches to generate a novel bacterial strain able to convert microPET into amino acids (plastic-eating activity) or high-value compounds (protein, lipid, chitin) through insects appropriately "modified." The goal is a paradigm shift, i.e., to enhance an environmental contaminant, potentially harmful even to human health, by converting it into a resource to produce goods useful to society, through a totally "green" approach.