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submitted 5 months ago by schizoidman@lemmy.ml to c/science@lemmy.world

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/16488358

Scientists Find Plastic-Eating Fungus Feasting on Great Pacific Garbage Patch

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[-] KidnappedByKitties@lemm.ee 70 points 5 months ago

Sounds like great news, no?

Just as we had a time before fungus digesting plant matter, we've now had a time before fungus digesting plastics.

"Soon" we'll get bacteria and insects doing the same, and all our plastic buildings will need to be protected just as the wood ones.

[-] ThePantser@lemmy.world 46 points 5 months ago

Can't wait to get a fungus infection that starts eating the micro plastics in my testicles.

[-] SuperIce@lemmy.world 20 points 5 months ago

I guess all plastic will be biodegradable eventually.

[-] 9488fcea02a9@sh.itjust.works 10 points 5 months ago

Not really good news for the plastic that isnt waste. Plastic pipes or structures in buildings that were meant to last decades we dont want eaten away by fungus

[-] balder1991@lemmy.world 6 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

Still it’s a positive net balance for the planet if it happens this way. But I think the “plastic safety” (in a food sense) would also end?

[-] intensely_human@lemm.ee 3 points 5 months ago

“The planet” doesn’t have interests so everything is neutral to the planet

[-] anton@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 4 months ago

Hate to break it to you, but if you store your food for years above freezing and without a protective atmosphere in a plastic container it's spoiled anyway.

[-] Kiernian@lemmy.world 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

To say nothing of how much cabling is covered by plastic.

Audio

Video

Vehicular

Aviation

Appliances...

...Telecommunications...

...Power...

[-] Chocrates@lemmy.world 5 points 5 months ago

For earth and the surviving creatures on it this is probably great news, but this is probably going to be a problem for humans in the short term. Plastic is this magic material that is immune to degradation and microbes, now that is no longer the case.

Ultimately that will be a good thing, but think about sanitized plastic medical equipment, now it can slowly be eaten up by microbes that we didn't have to worry about before.

[-] mister_monster@monero.town 0 points 5 months ago

Yup. Plastic's main selling point, it's durability, is no longer going to be a factor when choosing it as a material.

[-] Treczoks@lemmy.world 63 points 5 months ago

"Nature finds a way" -- Dr. Ian Malcolm

The plastic simply was a too nice of an energy source to be left aside by microorganisms. There are microorganisms for basically any energy source the world provides. There are bacteria that live on undersea volcanoes feasting on acids and carbon dioxide, so a fungus eating plastic is no actual surprise.

[-] d00phy@lemmy.world 26 points 5 months ago

Unless you include the “uh” in that quote I can’t hear Jeff Goldblum say it, and that’s a trigger I didn’t know it had. So, thanks?

[-] catloaf@lemm.ee 8 points 5 months ago

Also he said life, not nature.

[-] RvTV95XBeo@sh.itjust.works 11 points 5 months ago

"Life, uh, not nature" doesn't have the same ring to it

[-] balder1991@lemmy.world 3 points 5 months ago

It also impresses me that there’s bacteria eating metal under the sea.

[-] benjhm@sopuli.xyz 43 points 5 months ago

"...at a rate of roughly 0.05 percent per day ... would take a very long time" ... but by my quick calculation 0.9995^3650 is 84% per decade, which is not long. Almost instantaneous on a geological timescale - and think how much the world changed when fungi learned how to digest lignin in wood - ending the era of coal-forming swamps.

[-] Telodzrum@lemmy.world 32 points 5 months ago

It's going to be a significantly different number than that. You have to factor in growth rate in a resource-abundant environment as well as reduced access to food sources as more of the patch is consumed. But yeah, you're right that's actually a very fast rate of consumption of a non-naturally-renewing food source.

[-] dimath@ttrpg.network 38 points 5 months ago

I can't tell if it's a good news or bad news.

[-] Bbbbbbbbbbb@lemmy.world 37 points 5 months ago

Fungus are great news, the best nonplant plant in the ecosystem

[-] Chee_Koala@lemmy.world 6 points 5 months ago

Ahem, Mammals would like a word with you. MAMMALS RULE, FUNGUS DROOLS!

[-] illi@lemm.ee 13 points 5 months ago

It's mamals who generally drool though

[-] PlantJam@lemmy.world 7 points 5 months ago

Slime mold would like to have a drooly word.

[-] CheapFrottage@lemmynsfw.com 2 points 5 months ago

James Acaster has entered the chat

[-] krashmo@lemmy.world 18 points 5 months ago

Assuming it doesn't evolve the ability to digest human flesh after it eats all the plastic, I think this is great news.

[-] Rentlar@lemmy.ca 30 points 5 months ago

An interesting scifi plot could be where said fungi start hungering for the microplastics within us...

[-] classic@fedia.io 17 points 5 months ago

First they came for our patch then they came for our balls

[-] anton@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 4 months ago

Assuming you don't have the immune system of a plastic bottle you will be fine.

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[-] Azzu@lemm.ee 32 points 5 months ago

I would really like to know what's the resulting materials after the breaking down, but the article doesn't say :(

[-] AutistoMephisto@lemmy.world 11 points 5 months ago

Well, given what we know about most commercial plastics, which are all derived from oil/complex hydrocarbons, the consumed plastic could be broken down into condensed carbon? Or would it be carbon gases? I'm speculating based on just what I know about plastics, what they are and how they're made.

[-] eran_morad@lemmy.world 21 points 5 months ago

The fungi are likely oxidizing the plastic to CO2, probably via many metabolic intermediates. This is likely driven by the fact that plastics are chemically reduced - a rich source of chemical potential energy. Accessing that energy requires enzymatic conversion to a less reduced state, culminating in the fully oxidized CO2 molecule.

[-] nulluser@programming.dev 14 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

So, a byproduct of this process is, potentially, greenhouse gases? Yay.

[-] MonkderDritte@feddit.de 8 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

And some toxic compounds.

[-] onion@feddit.de 10 points 5 months ago

I've heard living organisms tend to output carbondioxide

[-] mister_monster@monero.town 3 points 5 months ago

That's because this narrative is at odds with another environmentalist narrative.

Carbon compounds are oxidized by non plant organisms to form carbon dioxide.

[-] intensely_human@lemm.ee 1 points 5 months ago

The resulting material is fungus? That’s how eating works

[-] mister_monster@monero.town 26 points 5 months ago

There's a lot of discussion in here about how great this is. And it is. But it is at odds with another environmentalist concern.

What if we could take carbon dioxide and turn it into something that can't be degraded by living organisms? Well, plastic is one of those things, or was. Plastic is a form of carbon sequestration.

These micro organisms, they're turning plastic into carbon dioxide. Any and all carbon compounds on earth will enter the carbon cycle. every drop of oil pulled out of the ground, even the stuff that's used to make plastic, will wind up in the atmosphere.

[-] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 17 points 5 months ago

Well, sure. And that's really bad for Ice Age evolved macro-species that require a certain survivable temperature and condition to thrive. But you're missing the bigger picture. For lots of plants and bacteria and various insecticidal organisms that thrive in hot, humid environments, this is going to be absolutely amazing.

Yes, humans are absolutely fucked, along with enormous chunks of the mammalian class of species. But life will continue on in exciting new ways.

[-] Hule@lemmy.world 2 points 4 months ago
[-] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 3 points 4 months ago

Algea and algea adjacent species, mostly.

[-] WolfLink@lemmy.ml 11 points 5 months ago

Conveniently, nature has provided us with another carbon sequestration method that has a lot of other benefits, ranging from being a good building material, to helping regulate the local temperature: trees.

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[-] casmael@lemm.ee 17 points 5 months ago

Like good news right but also fuck my life

[-] raynethackery@lemmy.world 12 points 5 months ago

If I recall correctly, the Andromeda Strain mutated into a form that ate plastic.

[-] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 11 points 5 months ago
[-] Plavatos@sh.itjust.works 2 points 5 months ago

Came here for this GIF, thank you for having it ready.

[-] ours@lemmy.world 2 points 4 months ago

Both books written by Michael Crichton so very fitting.

Before he went full-on raging anti-climate change nut.

[-] Paragone@lemmy.world 2 points 5 months ago

This may all SEEM fine & dandy, but..

The such ocean gyres, if I'm remembering what they're called correctly, had a normal, established-for-millions-of-years kind-of-ecology in them..

NOW, however, we're forcing that this fungus become a dominant-player in them..

WHAT DOES THAT FUNGUS DO TO THE OTHER ORGANISMS IN THAT ECOLOGY?


( people may remember some years ago when the Purple Loostrife we imported was killing all our North American marshes, turning them into thickets of woody stems/runners/etc, & each individual plant could put out 50,000 seeds per year...

So, the Canadian Gov't did test after test after test, & finally resolved that a .. Chinese, iirc, ladybird bug ate the stuff, but didn't eat any other plants..

so, they imported them & let them loose..

You know those new orange ladybird bugs?

the ones that bite animals?

Those are the ones, ttbomk.

They don't eat any other plants, other than purple loostrife, but their habit of biting us means that carnivorism is normal in them, and .. how does that affect the ecology??

You can't just arbitrarily alter ecologies & responsibly expect them to remain functionally-balanced, & in-harmony: consequences tend to multiply each-other, & tipping-points do get crossed. )

_ /\ _

[-] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 3 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

The ecology changes until a new balance is reached. People can be a bit overly fatalist about these realities. Its not like we've never witnessed an ecology change before.

But the more carbon we put into the atmosphere, the more this tiger-by-the-tail we've got called Climate Change is worked up. Bad news if your civilization craves stability.

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this post was submitted on 05 Jun 2024
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