Plastic Degradation ™

THE SOLUTION

To build a green
tomorrow, we must
break a plastic
yesterday.

Plastic is a macro problem.

Breaking is the micro solution.

Breaking down every
type of plastic.

Our technology, including both super microbes and super enzymes, have massive potential across a variety of use cases and industries.

Composting

Accelerate composting processes, producing nutrient-rich compost while minimizing environmental contamination from food packaging and plastics mixed with organic materials.

Plastic Recycling

Enhance plastic recycling by incorporating Microbe X-32™, a microorganism capable of degrading various plastics, into existing recycling processes, improving the efficiency and effectiveness.

Landfills

Transform waste management by efficiently degrading plastics within treatment facilities and landfill sites.

Digesters

Optimize anaerobic digestion by breaking down plastic contaminants, which could improve biogas production efficiency and reduce operational challenges associated with plastic waste digestion.

Biogas/Biomass

Enable efficient plastic degradation, which could enhance biogas and biomass production by increasing renewable energy yield while addressing plastic pollution.

Ocean Cleanup

Provide innovative solutions for ocean cleanup, targeting plastic pollution hotspots to facilitate removal and degradation of plastic waste and restoring marine ecosystems.

Wastewater Treatment

Treat wastewater contaminated with microplastics before it re-enters the environment.

Soil Decontamination

Clean up soil contaminated with plastic fragments or microplastics from agricultural practices or spills.

Industrial Sites

Remediate plastic-contaminated soil around industrial facilities that use or produce plastics.

WE'RE

We’re revolutionizing.

NEVER

We’re creating a healthier industry of plastic manufacturing.

We’re doing more than just Breaking. We’re using our data, research, developments and discoveries to build a new era of plastics with purpose.

It’s a simple idea. Creating SUSTAINABLE ALTERNATIVES. What if all new plastics were engineered to be easily consumed by MICROBE X-32™?

LOOKING

BACK

We’re revolutionizing.

We’re creating a healthier industry of plastic manufacturing.

WE'RE

NEVER

LOOKING

BACK

We’re doing more than just Breaking. We’re going to use our data, research, developments and discoveries to build a new era of plastics with purpose.

Rebuilding

Reviving

Future Earth-Saving Technologies Include

NEW BIOPLASTICS

ENHANCING BIOPLASTIC BIODEGRADABILITY

ELIMINATING PLASTICS IN FOOD WASTE

DEPOLYMERIZATION FOR CHEMICAL RECYCLING

PRODUCTION OF BIOFUELS & OTHER VALUABLE BIOMATERIALS

Plastic waste
& Microplastics

Breaking Down the Data

Research

Size and
GHG Emissions

Overall Waste

2/3

of all plastic ever produced has been released into the environment and remains there in some form.

Source: Plastic & Health: The Hidden Costs of a Plastic Planet, Center for International Environmental Law, 2019

Growth in Single-Use

From 2019-21, growth in single-use plastics made from virgin polymers was 15 times that from recycled feedstocks.


(Source: Plastic Waste Makers Index 2023).

Single-Use and GHG

Single-use plastic is not only a pollution crisis but also a climate one. Cradle-to-grave (Scope 1, 2 and 3) greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) from single-use plastics in 2021 were equivalent to ~450 million metric tons of carbon dioxide (MMT CO2e), more than the total GHG emissions of the United Kingdom.


(Source: Plastic Waste Makers Index 2023).

Plastic Production

Plastic production has sharply increased over the last 70 years. In 1950, the world produced just two million tons. It now produces over 450 million tons.


(Source: Plastic Pollution).

Human Health &
Consumption

Humans consume on avg

5

grams of
plastic per
week

which is equal to about one credit card, and 21 grams of plastic per month, which is about equivalent to approximately one lego brick.

CONSUMPTION

"Humans consume on average 5 grams of plastic per week, which is equal to about one credit card, and 21 grams of plastic per month, which is about equivalent to a lego brick.”

(Source: Assessing Plastic Ingestion from Nature to People, World Wildlife Fund, 2019).

BLOOD

A study published in 2022 found microplastics in human blood.

(Source: Discovery and quantification of plastic particle pollution in human blood, Environmental International 2022).

INHALATION

“Some fibrous MPs may be inhaled. Most of them are likely to be subjected to mucociliary clearance; however, some may persist in the lung causing localized biological responses, including inflammation, especially in individuals with compromised clearance mechanisms.”

(Source: Microplastics in air: Are we breathing it in? Current Opinion in Environmental Science & Health, 2018).

INFLAMMATORY EFFECTS

“In all biological systems, microplastic exposure may cause particle toxicity, with oxidative stress, inflammatory lesions and increased uptake or translocation. The inability of the immune system to remove synthetic particles may lead to chronic inflammation and increase risk of neoplasia. Furthermore, microplastics may release their constituents, adsorbed contaminants and pathogenic organisms.”

(Source: Environmental exposure to microplastics: an overview on possible human health effects, Science of The Total Environment, 2020).

CELL DAMAGE EFFECTS

“All plastic contains reactive oxygen species, or free radicals, which are unstable molecules that contain oxygen and easily react with other molecules in a cell. A build-up of free radicals in cells may cause damage to DNA, RNA, and proteins, and can lead to cell death.”

(Source: Plastic & Health: The Hidden Costs of a Plastic Planet, Center for International Environmental Law, 2019).

DECOMPOSING

Time to Decompose Plastics

Estimated Minimum and Maximum

Estimated Minimum

Estimated Maximum

Milk Carton

5 YRS

Rubber Boot Sole

40 to 80 YRS

Aluminum Can

80 to 200 YRS

Beverage Holder

200 to 450 YRS

Disposable Diaper

250 to 500 YRS

Fishing Line

600 to 650 YRS

Plastic Bag

10 to 1000 YRS

Plastic Bottle

450 to 1000 YRS

Styrofoam

500 YRS

With
Microbe X-32™

Breaking was able to demonstrate degradation of certain major plastic types down to

22 months
using indirect calculation from respirometry measurements.

Animal Health

Species

A peer-reviewed study found that

1,557 Species Worldwide,

including many endangered ones, have ingested plastic.

Deaths

Each year, an additional eight million tons of plastic end up in the world’s oceans where it is responsible for the deaths of up to.

1 million seabirds, 100,000 sea mammals, marine turtles, & countless fish.

(Source: The Ocean Conference 2017 Facts Sheet).

Environment & Ecological

Soil Fauna

In 2020, the first-ever field study to explore how the presence of microplastics can affect soil fauna was published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society. The paper notes that terrestrial microplastic pollution has led to the decrease of species that live below the surface, such as mites, larvae and other tiny creatures that maintain the fertility of the land.

Soil and plants

A study carried out in 2019 showed that when the soil was exposed to microplastics, specifically plastic fibers and PLA microplastics, fewer seeds germinated.

Landfill

Overall, 46% of plastic waste is landfilled, while 22% is mismanaged and becomes litter. Unlike other materials, plastic does not biodegrade. It can take up to 1,000 years to break down, so when it is discarded, it builds up in the environment until it reaches a crisis point.

Ocean & Water

Size

There are 21,000 pieces of plastic in the ocean for each person on Earth. Humans have filled the world’s oceans with more than 170 trillion pieces of plastic, dramatically more than previously estimated, according to this major study.

Coral Reefs

Invertebrate corals and coral reefs in tropical and sub-tropical countries have suffered immensely from MP pollution and have shown a gradually decreasing trend of coral reef concentration on the oceanic surface. The bioaccumulation and ingestion of MP debris by the coral polyps have hindered the growth of the corals and forced coral bleaching.

(Source: Microplastics in the coral ecosystem, Ocean & Coral Management, 2024).

Ground Water

“Thanks to their strong hydrophobicity, absorption capacity, and large specific area, MPs are in turn drivers for other contaminants during the seepage processes. In addition to their own toxic additives, MPs tend to adsorb and transport a wide range of organic and inorganic hazardous substances like heavy metals, pesticides, bisphenols, and antibiotics.”

(Source: Microplastics contamination of groundwater: Current evidence and future perspectives. A review, Science of The Total Environment, 2022).

Marine Litter

Plastics are the largest, most harmful and most persistent fraction of marine litter, accounting for at least 85 percent of total marine waste.

(Source: UN Sustainable Development Goals, The United Nations).

Size

“10 million tons of plastic are dumped in our oceans annually. That’s equal to more than a garbage truck load every minute.”

(Source: The Facts, Plastic Oceans, 2022).

Marine Life

If current trends continue, our oceans could contain more plastic than fish by 2050.

(Source: Tourism’s Plastic Pollution Problem, The One Planet Network, N/A).

Economic Impact

Economic Loss

Researchers estimate a loss of 1-5% in marine ecosystem services as a result of plastic pollution. This reduction equals a loss of about $500 billion to $2.5 trillion per year. That’s about $33,000 per metric ton of plastic pollution.


(Source: First in Science: The Economic Impacts of Plastic Pollution).

Impact on
Developing Countries

A WWF-commissioned report developed by Dalberg warns that the true cost of plastic on the environment, health and economies can be as much as 10 times higher for low-income countries, even though they consume almost three times less plastic per-capita, than high-income ones.


(Source: WWF REPORT: Who pays for plastic pollution?).

Economic Impact

Plastic pollution is one of the greatest human-made threats our planet faces. Of the approximately 275 million metric tons of plastic waste produced annually, up to 12 million tons leak into oceans, wreaking havoc on livelihoods and ecosystems. The result is an estimated $13 billion in annual environmental damage to marine ecosystems, in addition to other economic losses and significant health and human concerns.


(Source: Convention on Plastic Pollution: Toward a New Global Agreement to Address Plastic Pollution (June 2020)).

Putting an end to

the Plasticene Era

CLOSE

Sukanya
Punthambaker, PH.D.

Co-Founder and CEO

Sukanya Punthambaker, Ph.D., has over two decades of experience in life sciences research and biotechnology. Previously, she worked extensively with Dr. George Church at Harvard Medical School and the Wyss Institute, for a number of years on several technology development projects in synthetic biology, sequencing and protein engineering. She has held leadership roles having taught neuroscience to over 100 undergraduate students, while at the University of Michigan, collaborated with multiple scientists and teams at Harvard to take an idea to completion in the form of scientific publications and commercializations, and demonstrated multidisciplinary expertise working on a range of projects from DNA nanotechnology to genetically engineered microbes for sustainability.

She has received several highly prestigious awards including the Department of Biotechnology - Junior Research Fellowship, India, the Outstanding Graduate Student Instructor Award and the Okkelberg Award to an exceptional senior graduate student, both from the University of Michigan. She has co-authored impactful publications in reputed peer reviewed journals such as Nature, Science, NAR, PNAS, etc. She earned her PhD in molecular biology from University of Michigan Ann Arbor, MS in biotechnology and BS in microbiology, both from India.

Vaskar
Gnyawali, Ph.D.

Co-Founder and CSO

Vaskar Gnyawali, Ph.D. brings over 13 years of versatile engineering experience to his role as Chief Science Officer (CSO). His expertise spans various engineering domains, including computer engineering, microsystems, biomechanical engineering, and most recently, microbial engineering. Previously, at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University, he applied his expertise in solving complex biological problems, such as developing a novel encapsulation technology for the enhanced delivery of biologic drugs and smart food ingredients, under the mentorship of Prof. Donald Ingber.

Vaskar has garnered numerous accolades for his academic and entrepreneurial prowess, including the prestigious Governor General’s Gold Medal and Doctoral Completion Award for his outstanding achievements during his doctoral studies, and a leadership scholarship for his master’s degree. Furthermore, he has made significant contributions to impactful publications and inventions.

Vaskar earned his bachelor's degree in Computer Engineering from the Institute of Engineering at Tribhuvan University in Nepal. He continued his academic journey by obtaining a master's degree from the University of Freiburg in Germany. Later, he pursued his doctoral studies at Ryerson University (Toronto Metropolitan University) in Toronto, Canada, culminating in the attainment of his doctoral degree.

George
Church

Co-Founder

George leads Synthetic Biology at the Wyss Institute, where he oversees the directed evolution of molecules, polymers, and whole genomes to create new tools with applications in regenerative medicine and bio-production of chemicals. Among his recent work at the Wyss is development of a technology for synthesizing whole genes, and engineering whole genomes, far faster, more accurate, and less costly than current methods. George is widely recognized for his innovative contributions to genomic science and his many pioneering contributions to chemistry and biomedicine. In 1984, he developed the first direct genomic sequencing method, which resulted in the first genome sequence (the human pathogen, H. pylori). He helped initiate the Human Genome Project in 1984 and the Personal Genome Project in 2005. George invented the broadly applied concepts of molecular multiplexing and tags, homologous recombination methods, and array DNA synthesizers. His many innovations have been the basis for a number of companies including Editas (Gene therapy); Gen9bio (Synthetic DNA); and Veritas Genetics (full human genome sequencing).

George is Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical School and Professor of Health Sciences and Technology at Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He is Director of the U.S. Department of Energy Technology Center and Director of the National Institutes of Health Center of Excellence in Genomic Science. He has received numerous awards including the 2011 Bower Award and Prize for Achievement in Science from the Franklin Institute and election to the National Academy of Sciences and Engineering.

Donald
Ingber, M.D., Ph.D.

Co-Founder

Donald E. Ingber, M.D., Ph.D., is the Founding Director of the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University, the Judah Folkman Professor of Vascular Biology at Harvard Medical School and the Vascular Biology Program at Boston Children’s Hospital, and the Hansjörg Wyss Professor of Bioinspired Engineering at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. He received his B.A., M.A., M.Phil., M.D. and Ph.D. from Yale University.

Ingber is a pioneer in the field of biologically inspired engineering, and at the Wyss Institute, he currently leads scientific and engineering teams that cross a broad range of disciplines to develop breakthrough bio-inspired technologies to advance healthcare and to improve sustainability. His work has led to major advances in mechanobiology, cell structure, tumor angiogenesis, tissue engineering, systems biology, nanobiotechnology and translational medicine. Through his work, Ingber also has helped to break down boundaries between science, art, and design.

Ingber has authored more than 500 publications and 165 patents, founded 5 companies, and has presented 550 plenary presentations and invited lectures world-wide. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, National Academy of Medicine, National Academy of Inventors, American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He was named one of the Top 20 Translational Researchers world-wide in 2012 and 2020 (Nature Biotechnology), a Leading Global Thinker of 2015 (Foreign Policy magazine), and has received numerous other honors in a broad range of disciplines, including the Robert A. Pritzker Award and the Shu Chien Award (Biomedical Engineering Society), Rous Whipple Award (American Society for Investigative Pathology), Lifetime Achievement Award (Society of In Vitro Biology), Leading Edge Award (Society of Toxicology), Founders Award (Biophysical Society), Department of Defense Breast Cancer Innovator Award, and Wilbur Cross Medal from Yale University.

Ingber has made great strides in translating his innovations into commercial products and many are now either in clinical trials or currently being sold. Examples of technologies Ingber has developed include therapeutics for cancer and pandemic viruses; micropatterned culture substrate research tools; a dialysis-like sepsis therapeutic device that clears blood of pathogens and inflammatory toxins along with a companion diagnostic; an anticoagulant surface coating for medical devices that replaces the need for dangerous blood-thinning drugs; a shear stress-activated nanotherapeutic that targets clot-busting drugs and vasodilators to sites of vascular occlusion; low cost nasopharyngeal swabs and highly sensitive multiplexed electrochemical sensors for COVID-19 diagnostics; and Human Organ Chips lined by living human cells that are being used to replace animal testing for drug development and personalized medicine. Ingber’s Organ Chip technology was named one of the Top 10 Emerging Technologies by the World Economic Forum and Design of the Year by the London Design Museum. It was also acquired by the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City for its permanent design collection.

Bryan
Mejia-Sosa

Senior Scientist

Bryan Mejia-Sosa is a multidisciplinary scientist who earned his Bachelor's degree in Biological Engineering from MIT where his interest in synthetic biology and sustainable development first led him to study and engineer microbes for the production of terpenes as jet fuel precursors. He later graduated from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a Master's in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering where he modified oleaginous yeast for the production of value-added fatty acids. Since then, he's modified filamentous fungi and bacteria for various industrial applications, and now brings his diverse engineering background to Breaking.

Alba
Tull

Co-Founder

Alba Tull is a world-renowned storyteller, environmental activist, and philanthropist. She is currently on the board of Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Science Center, The Jackie Robinson Foundation, and is a member of Carnegie Mellon University’s Highlands Circle.

Kent
Wakeford

Kent Wakeford is co-founder and co-CEO of Form Bio, a leading computational biology platform with a mission of empowering scientists to discover and manufacture therapeutics for genetic diseases. He is a co-founder and former COO of Colossal Biosciences which partnered with Harvard and the George Church Lab to apply advancements in synthetic biology to loss of biodiversity.

Prior, Kent co-founded multiple technology and data science companies and has created over $3B in shareholder value, including one publicly traded company (IAS: NASDAQ). He is the co-inventor on over 85 patents in software and applied data science.

Benn
Lamm

Co-Founder

Ben Lamm is the co-founder and CEO of Colossal. Ben is a serial technology entrepreneur driven to solve the most complex challenges facing our planet. For over a decade, Ben has built disruptive businesses that future-proof our world. In addition to leading and growing his own companies, he is passionate about emerging technology, science, space and climate change. Active in angel investing, incubators and startup communities, Ben invests in software and emerging tech, and is deeply engaged in the technology, defense and climate change communities.

Prior to Colossal, Ben served as the founder and CEO to a number of companies, including Hypergiant, an enterprise AI software company focused on critical infrastructure, space and defense acquired by Trive Capital; Conversable, the leading conversational intelligence platform that helps brands reach customers through automated experiences acquired by LivePerson; and Chaotic Moon, a global creative technology powerhouse acquired by Accenture. Ben was also the co-founder of Team Chaos, a consumer gaming company acquired by Zynga.

Ben is a fellow of the Explorer’s Club, whose mission is to promote the scientific exploration of land, sea, air, and space by supporting research and education in the physical, natural and biological sciences. He also serves as a Scientific Advisory Board member on the Planetary Society and sits on the Advisory Board for the Arch Mission. Ben has appeared as a thought leader in many publications, including the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Forbes, Entrepreneur, Wired, TechCrunch, VentureBeat, and Newsweek on topics such as innovation, technology and entrepreneurship.

John
Warner, PH.D

Scientific Advisor

John Warner is one of the founders in the field of green chemistry. He wrote the book that provides the definition and 12 principles of green chemistry with Paul Anastas in 1998. As an industrial chemist, he has over 350 patents and has worked with hundreds of companies worldwide. He received the Perkin Medal in 2014 from The Society of Industrial Chemistry.

As an academic, he was a tenured full professor of chemistry and a tenured full professor of plastics engineering at the University of Massachusetts where he started the world’s first PhD program in Green Chemistry. He has over 120 publications in synthetic methodologies, non covalent derivatization, polymer photochemistry, metal oxide semiconductors and green chemistry. In 2022 he received the August Wilhelm von Hofmann Medal from the German Chemical Society and in 2004 the Presidential Award for excellence in science mentoring (PAESMEM) from the US National Science Foundation (NSF) and President George W Bush.

As an inventor, John’s inventions have led to the founding of many companies in the fields of photovoltaics, neurochemistry, construction materials and cosmetics. In 2016 he received the Lemelson Invention Ambassadorship from the Lemelson Foundation and the American Association for the Advancement of the Sciences (AAAS). John is a member of the Club of Rome, Distinguished Professor of Green Chemistry at Monash University in Australia, Distinguished Professor of Chemistry at Chulalongkorn University in Thailand, and Honorary Professor of Chemistry at the Technical University of Berlin where they have named the “John Warner Center for Start Ups in Green Chemistry.” John currently serves as President and CEO of The Technology Greenhouse.

Beth
Shapiro, PH.D

Scientific Advisor

Beth Shapiro is an evolutionary biologist who specializes in the genetics of ice age animals and plants. A pioneer in the scientific field called “ancient DNA,” Beth has traveled extensively in the Arctic regions of Alaska, Siberia, and Canada collecting bones and other remains of long-dead creatures including mammoths, giant bears, and extinct camels and horses. Using DNA sequences extracted from these remains, Beth’s work aims to better understand how the distribution and abundance of species changed in response to major climate changes in the past, and why some species and communities are more resilient than others, with a goal to help develop strategies for conservation of endangered species and ecosystems today. Prior to joining Colossal as Chief Science Officer, Beth was a Professor and Director of the Paleogenomics Laboratory at the University of California Santa Cruz and an Investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Beth is highly acclaimed for her research; she has been named a Searle Scholar, Packard Fellow, National Geographic Explorer, and MacArthur Fellow, and is an elected Fellow of both the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the prestigious American Academy of Arts & Sciences. She is also an award-winning popular science author and communicator whose books “How to Clone a Mammoth: The Science of De-extinction” (Princeton University Press 2015, 2020) and “Life As We Made It” (Basic Books 2021) explore how humans have been manipulating life on Earth for as long as we have existed and the potential of extending this to bring extinct species back to life.

Jon Kaneshiro

Scientific Advisor

Jon Kaneshiro is Vice President of Oahu Waste Services, Inc., Hawaii's largest waste hauling and recycling company. Jon oversees OWS and its subsidiaries' investments and strategic initiatives across their recycling and composting operations, real estate holdings, and expansion efforts. Prior, Jon held algorithm development and strategy positions in quantitative finance and technology firms.

Jon currently serves on the board of the Honolulu Board of Water Supply, the Island of Oahu's municipal water system. Jon has a bachelor's degree in civil and environmental engineering from Loyola Marymount University and a master's degree in environmental engineering from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Adnan Syed, Ph.D

Senior Scientist

Adnan spent 14 years at Harvard and the University of Michigan bridging ecological and genetic mechanisms of bacterial community formation. He is a holistic microbiologist skilled in assay development and high-throughput screening. Adnan is passionate about using biology to clean the world. Outside of the lab, Adnan loves to travel and share his wonder of the natural world with his kids.

Yuki
Sugimoto, Ph.D.

Yuki Sugimoto was born and raised in Japan. His academic journey led to earning a Ph.D in Natural Product Chemistry. Throughout his research, Yuki explored the intricate world of microbial metabolites. Now, with a focus on microbial engineering, he is dedicated to uncovering the remarkable abilities of microbes in order to solve environmental challenges.

Heidi
Schindel, Ph.D.

Sr. Bioinformatician

Heidi Schindel is a computational biologist specializing in applying multi-omics and AI/ML approaches to optimize non-model microbe engineering and scale-up efforts. She earned a PhD in Biochemistry from Indiana University, where she combined computational and lab techniques to characterize a novel bacterial microcompartment and multiple regulatory systems in purple photosynthetic bacteria. She then pursued a postdoc at Oak Ridge National Lab developing genetic tools for metabolic engineering of multiple non-model microbes as part of waste-to-fuels projects within the DOE Center for Bioenergy Innovation and Agile BioFoundry. She has since worked at climate-tech companies utilizing synthetic biology and computational approaches to help develop carbon-neutral cement (Biomason) and convert greenhouse gas emissions to useful chemicals (LanzaTech). Her industrial experience ranges from initial bacterial domestication and engineering to optimizing performance throughout the scale-up process. She is passionate about harnessing the potential of microbes to mitigate the effects of climate change and pollution and excited for the opportunity to be a part of Breaking.