Many thanks to the An­dreas Rühl Found­a­tion

Poly­hy­droxyalkanoate (PHA) is a bioplastic that is broken down and de­graded by mi­croor­gan­isms. PHA is widely used for dis­pos­able plastic products. In her doc­toral thesis, Car­oline Zeidler showed that an­im­als can break down PHA. With the fin­an­cial sup­port from the An­dreas Rühl Found­a­tion, the abil­ity and mech­an­ism of mar­ine meta­zo­ans to de­grade PHA-based plastic in mar­ine eco­sys­tems will be in­vest­ig­ated. Plastic pol­lu­tion of the oceans is an om­ni­present prob­lem, and we want to con­trib­ute to re­duce it with the fin­an­cial sup­port from the An­dreas Rühl Found­a­tion.

The in­sti­tutes of the Max Planck So­ci­ety are in­volved in re­search areas that are par­tic­u­larly in­nov­at­ive and of­ten re­quire a spe­cial fin­an­cial or tem­poral in­vest­ment. Al­though their im­port­ant role has long been re­cog­nised, we still know very little about mi­croor­gan­isms in the sea and their spe­cial func­tions and func­tion­ing. Filling this gap is the aim and pur­pose of our in­ter­na­tional and in­ter­dis­cip­lin­ary re­search. The dona­tion now re­ceived en­ables us to take a fur­ther step in our ex­plor­a­tion of this fas­cin­at­ing and im­port­ant hab­itat. We would there­fore like to ex­press our most sin­cere thanks to the An­dreas Rühl Found­a­tion - we are very grate­ful for their sup­port!