Degradation of petroleum-based plastics by bacteria

Description

Because of its indispensable role in human life, plastics production increases every year. The plastic accumulation in the environment and particularly in oceans, rises over the years. In this context, studying microbial communities able to grow on plastics and able to use plastic as a source of carbon seems essential in order to ultimately use bacteria to remedy this accumulation of plastic. Two main objectives will be explored in this thesis project. The first will consist of isolating, characterizing and testing the capacity of bacteria for the degradation of plastics. These bacteria have been selected in a previous study. Secondly, the evolution of bacterial consortia will be followed in the short and middle term, in parallel on 4 types of plastics to better understand the various factors involved in the selection of certain bacteria as observed during our preliminary studies.