anth_
2012-03-11 10:34:16
Just found this article, how cool is this? :)
http://mashable.com/2012/03/07/plastic-eating-fungi/Personally, I don't think any government will try to use it because they can't patent a plant, but they might try to synthetically use it.
Discuss.
Flight
2012-03-11 10:50:00
I once watched a show about some lady in India who made a simple machine to turn waste plastics back into fuel. She did a demonstration of collecting scrap plastic and running it through her machine to make fuel, then directly pored the fuel into a motorcycle gas tank and proved the purity of it. Very interesting to watch.
More time / money needs to be invested into things like this.
Sirenia
2012-03-11 14:01:41
Hope someone will use the fungi before it all gets killed by pollutions :(
Jokester
2012-03-11 14:07:34
Yeah no companies can really make good money off of it. Basic rule: If they can't make money off of it, it won't happen…
Mushini
2012-03-11 14:15:30
From: divina commedia
Personally, I don't think any government will try to use it because they can't patent a plant, but they might try to synthetically use it.
Discuss.
They can't patent a plant? LOL. Whatever..
Yeah Jokester, Flight, I agree with both of you.
Jokester
2012-03-11 15:09:02
From: Mushini
They can't patent a plant? LOL. Whatever..
Yeah Jokester, Flight, I agree with both of you.
They couldn't patent it but it doesn't SEEM like it would be that expensive… They probably wouldn't lose much money but they couldn't make any money so it wouldn't even be considered.
josh81193
2012-03-11 15:48:10
They could patent it, there are seed companies that have patents on the genetics of their seeds. They go as far as suing people who re-use their seeds… (referring to agriculture, wheat, corn, etc.)
Toby1
2012-03-12 13:52:02
Haha wow :P thanks for sharing
Jokester
2012-03-12 23:54:35
"But your honor! Why can't I claim rights to growing plants that grow naturally??" Yes! This should go over well…
cause
2012-03-13 00:37:31
Flight do you have a link to that?
Very cool about this fungi eating plastic, I wonder what it converts it to.
Fog856
2012-03-17 23:20:17
We really need this here in India. It's hard to walk on the streets now, looking at all the garbage.
But that's India.
kunzy
2012-03-18 07:03:04
Very interesting read lol nice onee
Benson
2012-03-18 19:47:08
They are currently playing with the idea of adding the fungi into plastic or adding weak spots into the plastic molecules so that it can be broken down. If they could find a stable form of this fungi and then add it to the plastic and give it like a 1 or 2 year timer before it would start reacting, then it would work. This is all happening in the crazy science community of course. And as for the money argument, it may not be a process of adding it directly to plastic AFTER the fact, but having it incorporated into the initial cost of making the bottle by adding it into the bottle (the same idea that I just stated above). Whether it eventually works or not is another story though :S