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it's not a given that this will happen on a human timescale. The carboniferous period lasted 60M years before bacteria evolved the ability to break down cellulo
by Jack000 4y ago
it's not a given that this will happen on a human timescale. The carboniferous period lasted 60M years before bacteria evolved the ability to break down cellulose.
- marginalia_nu 4y agoPlastic-eating bacteria have actually already been identified <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideonella_sakaiensis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideonella_sakaiensis> I think the big difference now from then is that we have a lot of bacteria that already are in the ballpark of doing the right thing, they just need some help with the polymer structure. That's perhaps a smaller gap to bridge.