PLASTIC-EATING BACTERIA CULTIVATION AND HIBERNATION
Plastic pollution is a serious global issue, with plastic production now exceeding 450 million tonnes and 1–2 million tonnes of plastic waste entering the oceans every year [1]. Biodegradation by microbes is a promising solution to this problem. We have built a smart bioreactor – a closed cultivation chamber that supports plastic-eating bacteria like “Ideonella sakaiensis”. The reactor’s environment is carefully controlled with nutrients and buffers, and its operation is managed by Arduino and ESP32 microcontrollers. An array of sensors (for gas, pH, and temperature) and actuators (heaters and valves) maintain optimal conditions, while a Raspberry Pi with a camera captures images for degradation analysis. All data (sensor readings and image results) stream to a remote web dashboard for real-time monitoring. In tests, our system maintained stable conditions for bacterial growth and successfully tracked plastic degradation, demonstrating the feasibility of this approach.