Gaia Biotechnologies

The name plastic is used for a wide variety of materials that are designed to be durable, mechanically strong, and airtight. These properties were a blessing for humankind for many years, but they create a major problem for our generation. Suppose you have breakfast, and when you are finished you are left with an empty banana peel and a bottle of orange juice. The banana peel is food for animals, insects, and millions of bacteria and will quickly break down and return to nature. The bottle was designed to do the complete opposite.

Once a piece of plastic reaches the garbage there is a time window of several years where it is collectable and recyclable. The story usually ends differently for billions of tons of plastic. Sun, wind, and other factors will break down the bottle into tiny particles called micro and nano-plastic. These plastic particles pollute oceans, ground, and air and get inside every living creature. It is in our food, we breathe it and drink it. It is estimated that an adult ingests up to five grams (the weight of a credit card) of microplastic every week. Plastic has an inflammatory effect, it is poisonous and causes cancer, and can even pass through the blood-brain barrier, reach the brain and cause irreversible damage.

Our generation faces the global garbage crises and takes action, but it was impossible to do anything with micro and nano plastic until Gaia-Bio came along. The tiny plastic particles are too small to be recycled, are impossible to collect, and are blended deeply into the environment. Even if we stop using plastic now, the particle problem will stick around for decades. Today’s microplastic comes from a plastic produced more than 20 years ago, and we are far from being able to handle the situation.

The solution

 Gaia-Bio’s scientists have adapted a groundbreaking SynBio technology developed at MIT for use outside the lab, on bacteria coming directly from the natural environment. Until now, “teaching” bacteria was only possible for specific types, and only in a controlled, laboratory setting. Gaia-Bio broke through the limitations and is the only company able to teach bacteria anywhere, under any condition. The cutting-edge technology enables Gaia-Bio to break down specific contaminations in any environment based on adapted bacteria directly from the polluted site.

Gaia-Bio’s micro plastic breakdown process doesn’t leave any leftovers or by-products or needs additional materials or energy. The teaching process is based on bacterial properties that already exist in nature, so it doesn’t involve expensive, long-term development processes. Gaia-Bio recognizes suitable natural bacteria and develops the required abilities accurately and with minimal effort, so the bacteria actually do most of the work.

The technology

The biological ability to break down plastic was first discovered in Japan, in 2016, when plastic (PET), one of the most commonly used types of plastic today) eating bacteria was found in the ground. This type of bacteria breaks down the huge polymer chains that plastic is made of into sugar that it can eat. Today, using cutting-edge SynBio technology, we can teach other types of bacteria to do the same.

The groundbreaking discovery of plastic-eating bacteria and SynBio technologies were only usable on a minimal number of bacteria types. These types need accurate laboratory conditions to survive the teaching process and to actually break down plastic. It was impossible to use the technology against micro and nano-plastic, which are impossible to remove from the environment. Gaia-Bio’s technology works on an infinite variety of bacteria outside the lab, taking biological plastic breakdown directly to the environment. Gaia-Bio’s bacteria actually come from the polluted environment and go back with the ability to clean it. Because they return to work in their natural conditions they live longer and produce high yields in short time.

Gaia-Bio’s breakthrough is the first step in the long process of healing our environment from particle plastic pollution. The process can be adapted to clean oil, medicine, insecticides, and fertilizers, all based on local bacteria. Gaia-bio also sees the industrial potential of its unique technology and uses it to identify and adapt specific bacteria for clean, efficient, highly profitable biological material manufacturing.