From Newsgroup: sci.misc

The bacteria turning waste plastic into painkillers

Earlier this year an extraordinary new way of using waste plastic made headlines.

A common bacterium was genetically engineered to eat a plastic-derived
molecule and then digest it to produce the everyday painkiller,
paracetamol.

The microbe used by Stephen Wallace, professor of chemical
biotechnology at the University of Edinburgh, was Escherichia coli,
better known as E. coli.

The rod-shaped bacterium is found in the intestines of humans and
animals, and you might be more familiar with it as an unpleasant bug
that can make us ill.

Prof Wallace chose it automatically because certain strains of E. coli
that aren't pathogenic are used extensively in biotechnology and
engineering biology laboratories to test whether something might work.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4gvm1kjxxvo

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