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New research has made encouraging progress in tackling not one but two of the biggest problems facing our planet right now:Like a lot of drugs today, acetaminophen is mostly made out of fossil fuels. Switching those ingredients for waste products – like plastic – couldIt's going to take a while to scale this up and prove it can be effective at an industrially and commercially viable level, so we shouldn't get too far ahead of ourselves, but there's a lot of potential in the new technology.
"This work demonstrates that PET plastic isn't just waste or a material destined to become more plastic – it can be transformed by microorganisms into valuable new products, including those with potential for treating disease,", which use phosphate as a catalyst to convert the molecules into an organic compound containing nitrogen. Finally, these compounds are turned into the active ingredientAmong the numerous advantages of the process are that it can be completed in 24 hours in a compact laboratory setup, and that it works at room temperature, so there's no need for excessive heating or cooling. What's more, the team has managed to get it working at an impressively efficient 92-percent yield., named after German chemist Wilhelm Lossen, who discovered it in 1872. Here, the reaction is made biocompatible so it can work in cells and living bacteria.This was all done using PET bottles, but the plastic is also used extensively in food packaging, furniture, and manufacturing. This type of plastic is estimated to account for more thanand other types of plastic, according to the researchers, so there's potential here for more environmentally friendly recycling and drug production options. It's a powerful example of how both natural and synthetic chemistry can be combined to find solutions to problems and drive innovation, and it may ultimately mean that"By contrast, the field of synthetic organic chemistry can access reactivity not observed in nature, and integration of these abiotic reactions within living systems offers an elegant solution to the sustainable synthesis of many industrial chemicals from renewable feedstocks."
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