Building blocks for plastics: Modified bacteria convert petroleum

26 October 2017

Thanks to a bacterium, a dream of chemists has now become reality. Equipped with special enzymes, the E. coli bacteria produce building blocks for plastics such as polyesters directly from alkanes – a component of petroleum – without using a lot of energy. This discovery was made at Wageningen University & Research (WUR).
To make plastics, the building blocks first need to be linked to one another. For this to take place, each building block requires a special chemical group at each end, similar to hooks and eyes. Alkanediols are important building blocks that can be used in the production of polyesters, polyurethanes, polyamides and other plastics (News Item WUR, 24 October 2017).
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