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Started By
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Would you eat it? Researchers can now turn plastic bottles into vanilla-flavor cookies
Posted on 8/28/26 at 1:22 pm
Posted on 8/28/26 at 1:22 pm
quote:
Scientists have transformed PET plastic into nutritious edible cookies, an innovation that could help address both pollution and hunger in one fell swoop. That is, if people can accept the idea of eating it.
Dubbed "µBites" (pronounced "microbites"), the cookies are made using yeasts that have been programmed to turn plastic into edible protein.
quote:
Commonly used to make disposable water bottles, PET plastic has low impurities, and is composed of approximately 60 percent carbon, 30 percent oxygen, and four percent hydrogen. Meanwhile, protein is formed from amino acids, which consist of a central carbon atom bonded to four other groups.
"We were trying to develop technologies for plastic upcycling to make more valuable products," associate professor Lahiru Jayakody said in a statement. "We thought, why not focus on making food? Because plastic is carbon and food is carbon."
quote:
To transform PET plastic into food, researchers went through a 32-step process which included using microorganisms to convert molecules into proteins, vitamins, and even flavourings. Microbes such as fungi and bacteria are already commonly used in the food industry, such as in fermentation, as well as to make molecules like insulin. Specific strains of bacteria have also been found to be capable of breaking down PET plastic.
https://mashable.com/tech/plastic-cookies-scientists-pet-edible-bottles
22
Posted on 8/28/26 at 1:24 pm to Shexter
Half our food supply has plastic in it anyway... 
Posted on 8/28/26 at 1:26 pm to Shexter
quote:
the cookies are made using yeasts that have been programmed to turn plastic into edible protein.
Posted on 8/28/26 at 1:35 pm to Shexter
Law of conservation of energy
Posted on 8/28/26 at 1:37 pm to Shexter
Literal microplastics.
Posted on 8/28/26 at 1:38 pm to Shexter
nope
Posted on 8/28/26 at 1:39 pm to Shexter
Bring on the macroplastics
Posted on 8/28/26 at 1:40 pm to Shexter
I'll wait until they can turn it into a believable ribeye.
Posted on 8/28/26 at 1:42 pm to Shexter
Plastic is solely derived from petroleum products. I don't know what they shite is in that cookie but it is not intended to be eaten.
Posted on 8/28/26 at 1:44 pm to Shexter
If it is digestible they sure.
Posted on 8/28/26 at 1:52 pm to Shexter
quote:
turn plastic bottles into vanilla-flavor cookies
I've seen that NileRed video.
Posted on 8/28/26 at 1:57 pm to GREENHEAD22
quote:
Plastic is solely derived from petroleum products.
quote:
"We thought, why not focus on making food? Because plastic is carbon and food is carbon."
Posted on 8/28/26 at 2:42 pm to Shexter
quote:
transformed PET plastic into nutritious edible cookies
quote:
nutritious
Posted on 8/28/26 at 2:44 pm to CocomoLSU
What is the calorie count?
Posted on 8/28/26 at 3:44 pm to Shexter
Always complaining about how we need to use more taxpayer money to help the impoverished in other countries. Let's offer it to them first, then we can revisit it in another 10+ years after we use plastic to solve the world hunger issue.
Posted on 8/28/26 at 3:44 pm to GREENHEAD22
quote:
Plastic is solely derived from petroleum products. I don't know what they shite is in that cookie but it is not intended to be eaten.
You have to widen your view or in this case maybe fosuing your view down to the atomic level makes more sense.
PET is C10H8O4 (the monomers are terephthalic acid and ethylene glycol) so you have all the elements to produce fat (glycerol, fatty acid chains, and special lipids; these lipids may need phosphorus and nitrogen), the sugars for carbohydrates, and amines for protein (which will also need nitrogen).
The point being it is easy to imagine chemical or biological processes that turn PET into the basic building blocks for food. The chemical process would likely be extremely complex and energy inefficient, which is why a biological process is used.
I have no question that PET can be converted into various fats, sugars, and proteins that are perfectly safe to eat and nourish a body at least at the macro level. The taste and texture side of food is another question, as is the efficiency of the process. I would imagine the main focus would be on space colonization.
Everything is just a mix of chemical elements; if you have a way to break a compound down and reassemble it into another compound like a protein, it can be identical to that protein produced in a cow's body for example.
ETA a good analogy would be that while you wouldn't fill up a cereal bowl with fertilizer and start scarfing it down, you would eat the vegetables that used the fertilizer to make proteins and sugars, and you would eat the cow that ate the plants. A lot of the hydrogen in those plants and animals came from natural gas.
This post was edited on 8/28/26 at 4:13 pm
Posted on 8/28/26 at 3:45 pm to Shexter
making the leap from micro-plastics to macro-plastics
Posted on 8/28/26 at 4:07 pm to Obtuse1
quote:
ETA a good analogy would be that while you wouldn't fill up a cereal bowl with fertilizer and start scarfing it down, you would eat the vegetables that used the fertilizer to make proteins and sugars, and you would eat the cow that ate the plants.
Get back to me when the lab cookies have evolved for a few millenia like the process you just described.
Posted on 8/28/26 at 4:08 pm to Shexter
Soylent Green!!!!!!!!
Posted on 8/28/26 at 4:15 pm to Shexter
Just when MAHA was getting petroleum dyes out of our food supply.
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