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Updated: Jul 13, 2026

Isolation and Screening from Soil Biodiversity for Fungi Involved in the Degradation of Recalcitrant Materials
Published on: May 16, 2022
Polyester-degrading thermophilic actinomycetes isolated from different environment in Taiwan
Min Tseng1, Kim-Chi Hoang, Mei-Kwei Yang
1Bioresource Collection and Research Center, Food Industry Research and Development Institute, 331, Hsinchu 300, Taiwan, ROC.
Abstract:
Thermophilic actinomycetes strains were isolated from various environment in Taiwan and screened for degradation of poly(ethylene succinate) (PES), poly(epsilon-caprolactone) (PCL) and/or poly(beta-hydroxybutyrate) (PHB) by the clear-zone method. Out of 341 strains of thermophilic actinomycetes, 105 isolates were PHB-degraders (30.8%), 198 isolates were PCL-decomposers (58.1%), and 99 isolates could degrade PES (29.0%). Furthermore, 77 isolates could degrade both PHB and PCL (22.6%), 35 isolates could degrade both PHB and PES (10.3%), 81 isolates could degrade both PES and PCL (23.8%) and 31 isolates could degrade the three polyesters used in this study (9.1%). Base on the morphological and chemical characteristics, these 31 isolates belonging to Actinomadura (12.9%), Microbispora (25.8%), Streptomyces (48.4%), Thermoactinomyces (9.7%) and Saccharomonospora genus (3.22%).
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