Part:BBa_K5023003

FAST-PETase

FAST-PETase is a mutant variant derived from the PETase enzyme. It contains five mutations compared to the wild-type PETase. These mutations include N233K, R224Q, and S121E from prediction, along with D186H and R280A from the scaffold. This enzyme demonstrated superior PET-hydrolytic activity relative to both wild-type and other engineered alternatives between 30 and 50°C across a range of pH levels. At 50°C, FAST-PETase showed the highest overall degradation of all mutants tested, releasing 33.8 mM of PET monomers (the sum of terephthalic acid (TPA) and mono-(2-hydroxyethyl) terephthalate (MHET)). The enzyme's activity against post-consumer PET (pc-PET) was substantially higher than that of other enzymes like WT PETase, ThermoPETase, DuraPETase, LCC, and ICCM under the same conditions. FAST-PETase was able to almost completely degrade untreated post-consumer PET from 51 different thermoformed products in just one week. The enzyme also demonstrated the capability to depolymerize untreated, amorphous portions of a commercial water bottle. A time-course analysis revealed an almost linear decay rate of PET degradation and a concomitant increase in crystallinity over time. The development of FAST-PETase offers a potential solution for the degradation of PET plastics, especially given its enhanced activity and stability across a range of conditions. This enzyme can play a pivotal role in addressing the environmental challenges posed by PET plastic accumulation.  

Reference=

Lu, H., Diaz, D.J., Czarnecki, N.J. et al. Machine learning-aided engineering of hydrolases for PET depolymerization. Nature 604, 662–667 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-022-04599-z