Comparación de la capacidad de biodegradación de plásticos de un solo uso por microorganismos aislados versus consorcios microbianos

Abstract

Plastic production is increasing year by year due to the great diversity of uses of these synthetic polymers to satisfy the demand of the industry and of a population that is growing to a great extent. The incorrect disposal and handling of single-use plastics and the indeterminate degradation times of most of these polymers are causing serious impacts on ecosystems, animal health and even affecting human health. To address this environmental problem, the use of living organisms to degrade these materials has been investigated for several years. This work is the continuation of previous results in which the commercial consortium of microorganisms was used, suggesting to increase the doses to evaluate the degradation potential of these microorganisms on polystyrene. The experimental phase consisted of the comparison of two doses of the commercial consortium (2mg/100 ml and 5mg/ 100ml) with an endophytic cocoa fungus on polystyrene plates under normal conditions and photooxidized polystyrene plates (300 hours of UV radiation). The results showed that both the bacteria of the commercial consortium of microorganisms and the fungus were able to colonize the plastic by using it as a carbon source and form a biofilm on the surface sheet, the maximum average weight of biomass generated reached 0.0118 g produced by the dose of 2mg/100ml. In relation to the percentage of degradation, it was found that the 5mg/100ml dose was the one that produced the highest percentage reaching 1.87% over the photooxidized plate, since this pretreatment plays a very important role in facilitating the colonization process for the organisms due to the increase of porosity in the material and changes produced in the chemical structure, mainly in the changes in the carbon-carbon bonds