ScienceDaily — Researchers now understand how bacteria can break down phosphonic acids, persistent and potentially hazardous environmental pollutants found in many common medicinal products, detergents and herbicides."We've achieved a critical step that has evaded other research groups for nearly 50 years," says David Zechel, a professor in the Department of Chemistry and an expert in enzyme catalysis. "Having successfully identified the proteins that are needed to break down these molecules, we can finally examine how this reaction actually works and engineer specialized bacteria in the lab to render these compounds harmless."
