It’s obvious that plastic pollution is a big problem nowadays. Luckily, researchers have found a chemical from a kind of worm can degrade one of the most common forms of plastic. The finding could open up new ways to deal with the problem.
There have been several studies showing microorganisms can release enzymes (酶) that cause the plastic polyethylene (聚乙烯) to start to change. But that process takes a long time. The recently-discovered enzymes were found in the saliva (唾液) of the wax worm moth. They appear to act in only a few hours.
Federica Bertocchini is one of the researchers who helped write a study on the finding. She is also a beekeeper. Bertocchini said that one year she found her honeycombs full of wax worms. Honeycombs are built by bees to store honey. She cleaned the honeycombs and put the worms in a plastic bag. When she returned, she found the bag was full of holes. All this made her wonder if the worms were eating the plastic or if there was a chemical reaction that caused the holes, leading to the idea of the research.
“We checked that, doing proper lab experiments, and we found the polyethylene had been oxidized (氧化),” she said.
In her latest research, Bertocchini and her coworkers identified two enzymes in the worm’s saliva. The enzymes appeared to break down polyethylene in only a few hours at room temperature. Bertocchini says her team is still trying to understand how the worms deal with the plastic. She adds, hopefully in the future, the enzymes can be used in homes, where each family could deal with their own plastic waste.
【小题1】What does the underlined word “degrade” in paragraph 1 probably mean?| A．Break down. | B．Bring forth. | C．Compete with. | D．Pick out. |
| A．They’re easily available. | B．They can be produced at home. |
| C．They function very fast. | D．They can be applied to all plastics. |
| A．How Bertocchini found the enzymes. | B．Why Bertocchini cleaned the honeycombs. |
| C．How Bertocchini took care of the honeycombs. | D．How Bertocchini came up with the idea of the research. |
| A．They will work at room temperature. | B．People can make them on their own. |
| C．They will solve all plastic pollution. | D．They will become a household product. |
