Biodegradation and Mineralization of Polystyrene by Plastic-Eating Mealworms: Part 1. Chemical and Physical Characterization and Isotopic Tests.

By Yu Yang, Jun Yang, Wei-Min Wu, Jiao Zhao, Y. Song, Longcheng Gao, Ruifu Yang, Lei Jiang. Environmental Science and Technology, 2015

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Microbial and Enzymatic Degradation of Synthetic Plastics (2020, background): “Yang et al. (2015) reported the complete genome sequence of Bacillus sp. strain YP1, one of isolates from the gut of P. interpunctella larvae that was implicated in polyethylene depolymerization and biodegradation.”
Food Wastes as a Potential new Source for Edible Insect Mass Production for Food and Feed: A review (2019, background): “Other applications of edible insects include biodegradation of polystyrene in the environment using Tenebrio molitor mealworm [33,34], use of black soldier for municipal organic waste management [35], and the use of non-mammalian models like Galleria mellonella larvae, also known as waxworm, to mode”
Microplastics in freshwater and terrestrial environments: Evaluating the current understanding to identify the knowledge gaps and future research priorities. (2017, background): “There is 142 evidence that biodegradation of polymers by some organisms can occur, for example bacteria, fungi 143 and mealworms (due to gut bacteria) (Gu, 2003; Yang et al., 2015a, b).”
Plastics: Environmental and Biotechnological Perspectives on Microbial Degradation (2019, background): “Labeling studies using -13C- or -13Clabeled polystyrol implied that the carbon compound was preferentially used to build lipids (71).”