SoT 294: Plastics Bad, Bacteria Good
Channel: Science on Top
Date: 2018-05-01

SoT 294: Plastics Bad, Bacteria Good
http://scienceontop.com/294

While studying the enzyme produced by a bacteria that eats plastic, an international team has accidentally made it even better.
NASA's new planet-hunding spacecraft has launched. TESS will study 85% of the sky, and will be able to study the mass, size, density and orbit of thousands of exoplanets.
Retrotransposons - elements of DNA that can spread to other species - are being found more and more often. And they're almost ubiquitous in marine animals, especially shellfish.

This episode contains traces of French President Emmanuel Macron speaking before the US Congress.

http://scienceontop.com/294

Chapters:
00:01:31 Scientists accidentally create mutant enzyme that eats plastic bottles https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/apr/16/scientists-accidentally-create-mutant-enzyme-that-eats-plastic-bottles
00:08:57 Everything You Need To Know About Tess, Nasa's New Planet-Finding Space Observatory http://www.syfy.com/syfywire/everything-you-need-to-know-about-tess-nasas-new-planet-finding-space-observatory
00:23:37 The Shellfish Gene https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/04/the-shellfish-gene/558131/
00:31:08 Science on Top http://scienceontop.com