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Carbios and the scientists behind it – the University of Toulouse biologists Alain Marty and Vincent Tournier – have been working in the field for more than a decade.
Carbios公司及其背后的科学家——图卢兹大学生物学家阿兰·马蒂和文森特·杜尼尔——已经在这一领域深耕了十多年。
While many other scientists began doing similar work after the publication of Oda’s discovery, Marty and Tournier started out in the mid-00s.
在小田教授公布发现后，许多其他科学家才开始从事类似的研究，但马蒂和杜尼尔在2005年左右才开始这项研究。
They used a different enzyme, called leaf compost cutinase (LCC), which did not evolve to work on plastic, but which Marty and Tournier thought had the potential to do so.
他们使用了一种不同的酶，即“叶枝堆肥角质酶”（LCC）。这种酶还没有发展到可以作用于塑料，但马蒂和杜尼尔认为它有这个潜力。
(The waxy coating of leaves, which the enzyme works on, bear a close similarity to plastic.)
（这种酶可以作用于叶蜡涂层，而叶蜡涂层与塑料非常相似。）
“It was a bit weak, and it didn’t work well with any kind of high temperature, but it was a good beginning,” Marty told me recently.
马蒂最近告诉我：“这种酶有弱点，在任何高温下都无法很好地起作用，但这是一个好的开端。”
Untold rounds of genetic engineering later, the enzyme clearly works.
从过往数轮基因工程来看，这种酶显然有用。
Gregg Beckham of the NREL research group says that LCC is “a great enzyme, for sure. It takes names and kicks butt.”
美国国家可再生能源实验室(NREL)研究小组的格雷格·贝克汉姆说叶枝堆肥角质酶“肯定是一种很好的酶。它会拥有姓名，表现出色。”
But he cautions that it is still imperfect.
但他也警告说，它仍然不完美。
It prefers highly processed plastic, and it’s not good at working in the acidic soup its own reactions create.
这种酶更喜欢高度加工的塑料，也不擅长在自身反应产生的酸性溶液中工作。
Beckham’s hope is that because the enzyme produced by Ideonella Sakeinsis probably evolved to specifically attack plastic, it will provide a better chassis to tinker with.
贝克汉姆认为，大阪堺菌所产生的酶可能是专门进化用于攻击塑料的，因此具有更大的改进潜力。
There is, of course, an element of competition here, with scientists casting a sceptical eye over their rivals’ work.
当然，科学家之间也存在一定的竞争，因此往往会对竞争对手的工作持怀疑态度。
When I mentioned Beckham’s comment to Marty at Carbios, he replied: “Every time there’s a new enzyme discovered – most recently this Ideonella Sakiensis one – it creates a lot of buzz. And so we test them – they never work very well in our tests.”
当我向 Carbios 公司的马蒂提起贝克汉姆的评论时，他回应说：“每当有新的酶出现时，例如最近的大阪堺菌酶，都会引起很大的轰动。我们也会进行测试，但根据我们的测试，它们的效果并不佳。”
After almost 20 years of collaboration, he is loyal to his leaf compost cutinase.
在近 20 年的合作研究后，他仍坚定对叶枝堆肥角质酶的研究。
Will highly evolved microbes really deliver us from the plastic crisis?
高度进化的微生物真的能让我们摆脱塑料危机吗?
Some scientists think the technology will remain limited.
一些科学家认为这项技术未来仍有局限性。
A recent critical review in the journal Nature noted that many kinds of plastics would probably never be efficiently enzymatically digested, because of the comparatively huge amount of energy required to break their chemical bonds.
《自然》杂志最近发表的一篇综述指出，由于打破化学键需要消耗巨大能量，酶可能永远无法高效地对多种类型的塑料进行降解。
