Engineering a microbiosphere to clean up the ocean – inspiration from the plastisphere

Abstract

Plastic is a ubiquitous material that has become an essential part of our lives. More than one hundred million tons of plastic has accumulated in the world’s oceans as a result of poor waste management. This plastic waste gradually fragments into smaller pieces known as microplastics and nanoplastics. These small plastic particles can cause significant damage to marine ecosystems, and negatively impact human health. According to a recent review of international patents, the majority of ocean-cleaning inventions are limited to microplastics larger than 20 μm. Furthermore, such technologies are ineffective for nanoplastics, which measure less than 1000 nm, or even fibrous plastics. Alternative solutions need to be considered for the large-scale in situ removal of microplastics and nanoplastics from the ocean. In this perspective, we present the concept of engineering a microbial ecosystem, which we term the microbiosphere. The concept is based on key observations that have been made for natural plastic-based ecosystems known as plastispheres. These observations relate to the solid support material, self-sustainability, attachment to plastic, degradation of plastic, and risk of pathogenicity. Inspiration can be taken from the plastisphere whereby a novel microbial ecosystem could be designed and engineered as a bioremediation tool to rid the ocean of micro- and nanoplastics. Such an engineered system could outcompete pathogens for marine plastic waste and potentially reduce the risk of infectious diseases.

The H-index is an unreliable research metric for evaluating the publication impact of experimental scientists

“…Provided the authors are well versed in their fields and choose a subject matter that is relevant and in alignment with the current research trends, the writing of a review or perspective article is a straightforward process. A perspective article relating to marine plastic waste that was published recently took me only three weeks to write from the conception of the idea to the final submitted version and that was without the assistance of text generators or literature analysis software (Alnahdi et al, 2023). With AI-based tools, this entire writing process could be expedited and-upscaled with powerful qualitative data analysis software and text-generating applications designed to survey the literature and rapidly generate textual material.…”

Applications of Bioremediation in Biomedical Waste Management: Current and Future Prospects

“…Poor waste management has resulted in more than one hundred million tons of plastic accumulation across the world's oceans. This plastic waste gradually broken down into smaller pieces called microplastics and nanoplastics which can cause significant damage to marine ecosystems, and negatively impact human health [27].…”

“…Recently, Alnahdi and coauthors [2023] have presented a concept of engineering a microbial ecosystem, termed the microbiosphere. to design a novel microbial ecosystem engineered as a bioremediation tool to get rid of the ocean of micro-and nanoplastics [27]. Various research has shown that different groups of bacteria, fungi and actinomycetes possess unique property of degrading molecular chains in polymers of both natural and Brazilian Archives of Biology and Technology.…”

Microplastic Pollution: Threats and Impacts on Global Marine Ecosystems

“…Cleanup efforts are another important component, although they should not be relied upon as the sole solution due to the vastness of the oceans and the difficulties in collecting microplastics [156]. Nonetheless, ongoing initiatives to remove larger plastic debris, which can break down into microplastics, from the environment are important.…”