Plastic Eating Mushroom
(Pestalotiopsis microspore)
We are proud to now offer this rare species to our customers
This is the fungus that eats plastic. Also it has MANY medicinal implications and produces very powerful chemo-therapy chemicals (Taxol) among other implications. It is extremely robust and antibiotic and antifungal.
We use polyurethane to make just about everything, garden hoses, furniture, water bottles etc. It’s easy to produce, durable, and dirt cheap. What it isn’t is recyclable there isn’t a single natural process that breaks it down. That is until a newly-discovered Amazonian fungus takes a bite.
Pestalotiopsis microspore is a resident of the Ecuadorian rainforest and was discovered by a group of student researchers led by molecular biochemistry professor Scott Strobel as part of Yale’s annual Rainforest Expedition and Laboratory.
It’s the first fungus species to be able to survive exclusively on polyurethane and, more importantly, able to do so in anaerobic conditions(no oxygen) the same conditions found in the bottom of landfills. This makes the fungus a prime candidate for bioremediation projects that could finally provide an alternative to just burying the plastic and hoping for the best.
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