• Sridevi Veluru
• Rishi Mallisetty
• Sai Spandana Bandi
• Meghana Seereeddi
• Hussam Taleb

Plastic is widely used and present in most of the materials we use every day, but the degradation rate of plastic is very slow. Due to this slow degradation, deposition of plastic waste became a huge problem resulting in the pollution of our environment. Among different types of plastics, Polyethylene is most widely used plastic in the world which is toxic to human health & aquatic organisms. In this article we discussed the biological methods i.e. microorganisms to increase degradation rate of plastic. Biodegradation is an eco-friendly method where microorganisms or the enzymes produced by microbes act on the plastic materials and degrade into simpler compounds by utilizing plastic as the sole carbon source for their growth. Different microbial strains act on different types of plastics which results in variation of degradation rates. The mechanism of biodegradation can occur in aerobic and anaerobic conditions and seems to be simple but it involves complex 3 step processes like depolymerization, random chain scission and side group elimination. Different factors are involved in the biodegradation process. Among these temperature, inoculums, pH and initial concentration are considered in this review. When optimal temperature and pH are considered for a particular microorganism, then the rate of degradation can be identified as maximum. In this review we briefly discussed the types of plastics, complications involved in using plastics, types of treatment methods for degradation, different microorganisms used for biodegradation, and factors affecting the process of biodegradation.

Plastic Pollution, Biodegradation, Microorganisms, Environmental threat, Temperature.

" ROLE OF BIOLOGICAL AGENTS IN PLASTIC REMEDIATION- A REVIEW", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.9, Issue 1, page no.d504-d518, January-2022, Available :http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR2201364.pdf

" ROLE OF BIOLOGICAL AGENTS IN PLASTIC REMEDIATION- A REVIEW", International Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (www.jetir.org | UGC and issn Approved), ISSN:2349-5162, Vol.9, Issue 1, page no. ppd504-d518, January-2022, Available at : http://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR2201364.pdf