[A ‘superworm’ crawling on a piece of styrofoam in a petri dish]
[A tupperware full of ‘superworms’ used in the control group of the study, which were fed oatmeal]
[Liu Yinan wearing gloves and using tweezers to hold up a ‘superworm’ on a piece of styrofoam]
[Yinan working in a laboratory within the Singapore Centre for Environmental Life Sciences Engineering (SCELSE) at Nanyang Technological University (NTU), as a colleague walks up to join him]
[Yinan using tweezers to place fresh plastics into a solution of ‘superworm’ gut biomes]
Liu Yinan (interview): “We bought ‘superworm’ from local pet store. This ‘superworm’ is very famous because they can eat and break down plastics.”
[Sakcham Bairoliya holding up a piece of degraded styrofoam, with Bairoliya visible in the background]
[Bairoliya’s hand swirling a flask of fresh plastics in a solution of ‘superworm’ gut biomes]
[Yinan and Bairoliya walking within the aisles of a laboratory at SCELSE]
Sakcham Bairoliya (interview): “Once the worms are done feeding with plastics, this is what it looks like. They create holes. We take out the microorganisms from their gut and we put them in flasks with fresh plastics. So, that eventually they start growing on them and degrading them.”
[Focus from ‘Superworm’ gut biomes without plastic to flask of ‘superworm’ gut biomes with plastics]
[Three ‘superworm’ groups used in the experiment]
[‘Superworms’ in a tupperware on top of a printed version of the recent research paper published based on the experiment]
Cao Bin (interview): “Our study is one of the few studies in this region to look at the microorganisms and plastic interaction in the marine environment and with the ultimate goal to develop novel bio processes for us to manage the plastic waste well.”
[Sign at the National Museum of Singapore’s Plastic101 exhibit that says “Plastic” and is made up of plastic waste]
[Sign at the National Museum of Singapore’s Plastic101 exhibit that explains how plastic was invented in 1907 and the chemicals used to create plastics]
[A map at the National Museum of Singapore’s Plastic101 exhibit that shows that more than 50% of the world’s plastic is produced in the Asia-Pacific region]
Cao Bin (interview): “Those processes can be a series of reactions to transform these plastic materials into either monomers, or the relatively small molecules that can be converted into something that is even more valuable.”
[Plastic waste, mainly the plastic cups for iced drinks and straws, inside a trash bin at a food court]
[Staff tying up a plastic trash bag filled with plastic waste at a food court]
[A woman texting next to her takeout meal, which includes several single-use plastics]
[People eating McDonalds at a food court, while using single-use plastic cups]
[A person drinking from a single-use takeout coffee cup from McDonalds that was wrapped in a single-use plastic bag]
[Rain pouring on recycling bins at a food court]
Chris Rinke (interview): “We have a big plastic problem and we need a sustainable method to take care of that problem. And we can look into nature, let’s say the ‘superworms,’ right? And learn from nature, learn how the worms, learn how the microbes, break it down. And then we can use this method in an industrial case and hopefully that will help with the recycling of this large amount of plastic that we have.”
[Focus of the control group of ‘superworms’ in a tupperware that were fed oatmeal to a tupperware filled with the experimental group of ‘superworms’ that were fed styrofoam]
[Yinan using tweezers to move ‘superworms’ into a petri dish with styrofoam]
[‘Superworms’ in a petri dish with styrofoam]
Chris Rinke (interview): “To take care of our plastic waste crisis, we ‘A’ need to use less plastic. ‘B’ we need to shift to products that are more sustainable, like coffee cups that we can reuse multiple times. And ‘C’ we need to increase our recycling effort and for that we can use the ‘superworm’, this natural method to use ‘superworms,’ their microbes and their enzymes to recycle plastics.”
[The three ‘superworm’ groups used in the experiment]
[Yinan using tweezers to return ‘superworm’ into a tupperware of other worms and styrofoam]
This script was provided by The Associated Press.