Siracusa Chiara, Celestre Virginia, Quartinello Felice, Damonte Giacomo, Madsen Jeppe, Guebitz Georg M, Daugaard Anders Egede, Pellis Alessandro
acib GmbH, Konrad-Lorenz-Strasse 20, 3430 Tulln an der Donau, Austria.
Institute of Environmental Biotechnology, Department of Agrobiotechnology, IFA-Tulln BOKU University Vienna, Konrad-Lorenz-Strasse 20, 3430 Tulln an der Donau, Austria.
ACS Sustain Resour Manag. 2025 Jan 23;2(2):334-342. doi: 10.1021/acssusresmgt.4c00430. eCollection 2025 Feb 27.
Poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET) is still a major player in the plastics industry, especially for packaging. Despite attempts to derive its basic components from biological resources, production of terephthalic acid (TPA), one of the two PET monomers, still depends on fossil resources. Alongside traditional polyesters, TPA is a building block also for biodegradable polymers, such as poly(1,4-butylene adipate--1,4-butylene terephthalate) (PBAT). Here, PET, PBAT, and real plastic waste were successfully depolymerized using cutinase as an environmentally friendly alternative to mechanical or chemical treatments allowing recovery of TPA even from mixed plastic waste. This monomer was isolated in high purity upon acidification as confirmed by using Fourier Transform-Infrared Spectroscopy, H-NMR spectroscopy, and Thermogravimetric analysis. Consequently, contaminants or residual buffer salts caused major issues during synthesis of PET precursors upon reaction with ethylene glycol (EG) and TPA. The recovered TPA was used to prepare bis(hydroxyethyl) terephthalate (BHET) and further repolymerized to PET. The resulting molecular weight of the polyesters was found to be dependent on the purity of the TPA and on the catalyst used.
聚对苯二甲酸乙二酯（PET）仍然是塑料行业的主要产品，尤其在包装领域。尽管人们尝试从生物资源中获取其基本成分，但PET的两种单体之一对苯二甲酸（TPA）的生产仍依赖化石资源。除了传统聚酯外，TPA也是可生物降解聚合物的原料，比如聚（1,4 - 丁二醇己二酸酯 - 1,4 - 丁二醇对苯二甲酸酯）（PBAT）。在此，使用角质酶成功地将PET、PBAT和实际塑料废料解聚，作为机械或化学处理的环保替代方法，甚至能从混合塑料废料中回收TPA。经傅里叶变换红外光谱、氢核磁共振光谱和热重分析证实，酸化后可高纯度分离出该单体。因此，在与乙二醇（EG）和TPA反应合成PET前体的过程中，污染物或残留缓冲盐引发了重大问题。回收的TPA用于制备对苯二甲酸双（羟乙酯）（BHET），并进一步重新聚合成PET。发现所得聚酯的分子量取决于TPA的纯度和所用催化剂。
