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Plastic makes up nearly 70% of all ocean litter, putting countless aquatic species at risk. But there is a tiny bit of hope—a teeny, tiny one to be precise: Scientists have discovered that microscopic marine microbes are eating away at the plastic, causing trash to slowly break down.
[...] Both types of plastic lost a significant amount of weight after being exposed to the natural and engineered microbes, scientists reported in April in the Journal of Hazardous Materials. The microbes further changed the chemical makeup of the material, causing the polyethylene’s weight to go down by 7% and the polystyrene’s weight to go down by 11%. These findings may offer a new strategy to help combat ocean pollution: Deploy marine microbes to eat up the trash. However, researchers still need to measure how effective these microbes would be on a global scale.
Perhaps one day Earth's inheritors will snack on Big Mac...wrappers.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by bob_super on Tuesday May 21 2019, @11:51PM (3 children)
Please edit away any "this", "these", "that" used in the present tabloid manner in article titles.
In this particular case, as often, no substitution is even needed. The word is just there to drive clicks, because people are easily-manipulated morons.
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Wednesday May 22 2019, @01:30AM
It does help indicate that it's specific microbes, not just the ones that happen to be near the plastic in question. I propose the following instead: "These mouse-sized microbes are munching away at Plastic Waste in the Ocean."
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Wednesday May 22 2019, @07:17AM
"Tiny" is pretty redundant too. If they weren't tiny then they wouldn't be microbes.
If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 22 2019, @10:32AM
"Microbes Eat Plastic" is minimal and correct, but will you comment on it? Will anyone?
We often had this discussion in the Slashdot days. Some complained that they only wanted straight up information. The vast majority laughed at them for reading the articles like noobs; it was the running joke that the guy who RTFA'd was the greenhorn. It was during Beta that everyone collectively realized that the discussion in the community was the value proposition that Dice could not fathom. So it is here.
Yeah, clickbait titles are irritating. But it's the grit that causes the oyster to produce the pearl.
Washington DC delenda est.