Life in plastic is not fantastic!

Humans are destroying the world. We caught onto this fact many years ago and the UN hence established the SDGs— sustainable development goals. These are the 17 goals that aim to not only reduce our negative impact on the world, while improving the quality of our lives. 17 goals to be achieved by 2030 but the responsibility is not only to countries and public organisations, but also private entities, scientific organisations, and every individual that shares the earth. We have less than a decade left but have we made significant progress in these goals? As technological progress keeps evolving, so does synthetic biology as well and we are striving to gear towards a better future by utilising its power to our advantage.
While the challenges may seem overwhelming, every small effort adds up— after all, every drop makes an ocean. At Morpheus, we understand that meaningful change requires collective action, and we're one of those drops, playing our part in the global movement toward sustainability.

Our Sustainable Development Goals

Imagine a world where our plastic waste transforms into valuable resources through synthetic biology. This vision is not only fascinating but essential, in a world where plastic production - and subsequently, though not to a proportional degree, waste - has more than doubled over the past two decades. Polyethylene terephthalate (PET), the most widely produced and common polymer worldwide, is most often found in bottles and packaging, contributing significantly to ocean and landfill pollution. Currently, about 70% of global plastics become waste. Only around 41% of post-consumer plastic waste is recovered through recycling or incineration, while 40% is disposed of in landfills and 19% makes its way into oceans or onto coastlines. At present, the accumulation of PET waste is steadily increasing and poses a growing threat to ecosystems worldwide. It is estimated that microorganisms in the environment take hundreds of years to fully degrade PET plastics. Developing microorganisms capable of degrading PET into vanillic acid holds promise as it transforms plastic waste into a valuable molecule used across various industrial sectors. This approach provides a sustainable pathway for utilizing plastic waste and supports a circular economy.

Our focus is on two critical SDGs—#6 (Clean Water and Sanitation) and #12 (Responsible Consumption and Production). These goals are not on track to being achieved by 2030 though they address urgent issues that impact our planet and our communities. SDG #6 focuses on ensuring universal access to clean water and sanitation. This means improving water quality, protecting water ecosystems, and addressing water scarcity. With over 2 billion people currently lacking safe water and adequate sanitation, this goal is essential for reducing disease, promoting health, and building resilient communities. SDG #12 aims to modify how we produce and consume goods by promoting efficient resource management and waste reduction. It encourages the adoption of sustainable practices that minimise environmental harm. From reducing food waste to creating circular economies, this goal is vital for ensuring that our consumption patterns do not exhaust the planet’s resources.


It is no secret that microplastics are extremely dangerous because of their innate inability to be broken down or filtered. Their extremely small size allows them to pass all conventional filters that are being used in developed countries. This is precisely why the problem only exacerbates in poorer countries with bad access to sanitation, making more than 2.4 billion people living in water-stressed countries. Overall, that same amount of people lack basic sanitation as well. In addition, at least 260 species are affected by microplastics in the oceans, with 100 million dying of that same problem each year. Our sustainable solution is using Chlamydomonas, known to snack on PET. We aim to clean polluted water bodies (an idea that has been around for a while) but we elevate this method by inducing the production of precursor molecules which can synthesise Vanillin. A compound in high demand in a variety of industries. A new, eco-friendly source of vanillin can be introduced to the markets to boost healthy competition and potentially help the economy. We thus aim to close the circuit of our production, making our project into a possible idea for the implementation of a circular economy.

Our project in practice

So, how can this be achieved?
Our project is divided into 2 key steps. The first one involves converting PET into TPA (Terephthalic acid) and EG (ethylene glycol). Specific genes encoding for the enzymatic reactions are inserted directly into the genome of Chlamydomonas. The second key step is obtaining a precursor molecule, PCA (protocatechuic acid), needed for the synthesis of vanillin via a series of chemical reactions. This is our current destination. In the future, the aim would be to understand various steps and key molecules that we need in order to actually obtain vanillin as our final product. Our synthetic vanillin production finally would need to be scaled-up, purified and packaged, ready for the various industries that demand it.
There have been specific goals that we have tried to hit, namely :
- Target 6.1
By 2030, achieve universal and equitable access to safe and affordable drinking water for all
- Target 6.3
By 2030, improve water quality by reducing pollution, eliminating dumping and minimising release of hazardous chemicals and materials, halving the proportion of untreated waste-water and substantially increasing recycling and safe reuse globally
- Target 6.6:
“Protect and restore water-related ecosystems, including mountains, forests, wetlands, rivers, aquifers, and lakes”
- Target 12.4
By 2020, achieve the environmentally sound management of chemicals and all wastes throughout their life cycle, in accordance with agreed international frameworks, and significantly reduce their release to air, water and soil in order to minimise their adverse impacts on human health and the environment.
- Target 12.8
Provide the public with the best resources, so that they can make an informed and educated choice

PET degradation by Ideonella sakaiensis. Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) is converted to mono(2-hydroxyethyl) terephthalic acid (MHET) by the enzyme PETase. MHETase transforms MHET into ethylene glycol (EG) and terephthalic acid (TPA) which are assimilated and incorporated into the citric acid cycle and β-ketoadipate pathway, respectively. Enzymes are underlined. Created with BioRender, courtesy of Tom de Kanter, Delft University of Technology





A single action can have more than one consequence which is why we believe that our solution can also affect other SDGs like #8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth), #13 (Climate Action), and #14 (Life Below Water). Economic growth is one of the most important indicators of the success trajectory of a nation. Financial progress should be defined by meaningful and fulfilling job opportunities, not only by the sheer numbers taken at face value. The reason being that more than one fourth of the world's population is in a precarious job with little to no social protection.
As the world is evolving faster and faster, there needs to be more opportunities to create new and diverse professions on the market. Vanillin, which is the by-product of our project, has long been used as one of the most economically viable molecules on the market. It has been used in many industries across the market - pharmaceutical, cosmetic, even the tobacco one. Therefore it is essential that apart from the vanilla plant, we can extract the molecule from other sources, since the demand for it has been skyrocketing. However, we also realise the sheer difficulty of the direct creation of vanillic acid from plastic degradation. We aim to find the most feasible and economically valuable molecule that can be used as a potential precursor in the whole production chain.
When it comes to climate action, it is really one of the goals that doesn't need any introduction. There has hardly been a generation prior to our that has been more sensitised about the issue than us; yet, the obstacles feel insurmountable. Climate change is bad for everything, the biodiversity, the people, the world. The rate of sea levels has nearly doubled in the last two decades, the ice caps are melting, species are disappearingAnd plastic has a big role to play in this as well, since the industry is one of the fastest-growing sources of industrial greenhouse gas emissions in the world. The production of the polymers has been exponentially growing yet we are incapable of breaking them down. There needs to be a new plastic economical model put in place for us to be successful in our goal.
The consequences of the plastic boom can be felt especially in the oceans and waters across the world. There are currently 150 million tons of the polymer floating around, with up to 13 million tons being thrown away each year. Our goal is to focus on bioremediation: to reduce pollution in the world’s precious water bodies.

We aimed to try and better the situation by focusing on:
- Target 8.3
Promote policies to support job creation and growing enterprises.
- Target 13.3
Improve education, awareness-raising and human and institutional capacity on climate change mitigation, adaptation, impact reduction and early warning.
- Target 14.1
By 2025, prevent and significantly reduce marine pollution of all kinds, in particular from land-based activities, including marine debris and nutrient pollution.



Zoom on our SDG pages

Our Magazine aims to give a full view of our iGEM experience as well as guide readers to better understand our project, which is why a section is dedicated to our Sustainability Goals, our project's impact and the difficulties it raises!




References

  1. de Kanter, Tom. (2022). Microbe-Microplastic Axis: Microplastics As Both Microbial Toxin and Tool. 10.13140/RG.2.2.34896.99846.
  2. https://blog.igem.org/blog/2020/8/26/igem-amp-the-sustainable-development-goals