The future for biochemical recycling of poly(ethylene terephthalate): From lab to process

Plastic wastes have posed great burdens to the distribution of global resources and environment. The advances in identifying and optimizing the action of polyethylene terephthalate (PET)-degrading enzymes to degrade and recycle polymer feedstocks have attracted significant attention. The recent progresses concerning polymer properties that influence enzyme degradation potency, the state-of-the-art protein engineering techniques on thermophilic and mesophilic PET-degrading enzymes, and enzyme production/display platforms are summarized here. Although the contents mostly focus on PET-degrading enzymes, the course of developing the workflow should be important lessons for establishing the biochemical degradation techniques for other synthetic polymers.