E.Coli Can Make Bendable Plastic For Use In Space
Tools are not easy to replace in space. Periodically, things like wrenches and mesh safety tethers aren’t prohibitively difficult to bring to the International Space Station, but in the future, longer manned missions mean that astronauts will need a better way to create plastic when few of the typical resources are available. To solve this problem, scientists have turned to biology. A team of researchers from Brown and Stanford Universities has genetically engineered E. Coli bacteria to make flat, space-efficient sheets of plastic that can be folded into tools. The researchers presented their work at the International Genetically Engineered Machine competition this fall, as the New Scientist reports. The researchers first needed to figure out which types of plastic best fit their needs. After melting a number of plastic food utensils under heat lamps and testing their chemical makeup, the researchers found that polystyrene worked best for...