Talk title: Life in Plastic, It’s Fantastic: The microbial metabolisms of polyethylene and the implications for social phenotypes

Summary: Microbes are responsible for breaking down recalcitrant organic matter like lignin and chitin and thus reintroducing those molecules back into nutrient cycles. To do so, these microbes invest lots of energy into creating powerful arsenals of enzymes. These microbes are now challenged globally with novel recalcitrant polymers known collectively as plastic. Studies have found that there is little to no correlation of plastic degrading enzymes and the amount of plastic in the environment- leading to the conclusion that in general, microbes are not evolving to specialize on plastic degradation. However there is yet to be a satisfactory explanation as to why environmental degradation is so limited.

While many microbial enzymes have been tested or hypothesized to degrade plastic, research on plastic biodegradation has primarily focused on one species at a time, and very few have been proven to work with polyethylene, the most widely used and hardest to degrade plastic. My dissertation will focus on characterizing microbial metabolisms of PE and its degradation products, and using these characteristics to predict the ecological relationship between members of a small modular community. This research will connect microbial metabolisms and ecology to investigate why environmental degradation is limited, and how metabolisms impact the function of plastic degrading synthetic consortia.