Posts Tagged ‘Pestalotiopsis microspora’

Natural Fungus That Eats Our Trash

Written by Michael Awada on . Posted in Science

Fungus

There are millions of people on Earth who litter and think nothing of it. Biodegradable items such as banana peels are kosher, as they usually disappear in under a month. One of the peskier items to be littered is plastic. Plastic has plagued scientists, due to it’s lingering nature and it’s inability to be properly disposed of. It is feared that it can take anywhere from 500-1,000 years for plastic to decompose in landfills.

Countless consumer items are based out of plastic, many we don’t even realize are a plastic. In this disposable day and age where items quickly lose their value and we toss them we buy more, the question of where all of the mounds of trash worldwide will go has been a plaguing concern. We may be on the right path to solving this issue. A group of students and professors from Yale made an astounding discovery this month; uncovering a fungi that eats pesky plastics to survive.