Superflies Are Designed By Scientists To Eat Human Waste And Clean Up Our Streets

Engineers at Macquarie University in Australia have started creating flies as a solution to the global trash problem. Based on the ordinary black soldier fly, the modified insects can consume a variety of organic waste, including leftover food and industrial leftovers.
According to a recent study by the scientists in the journal Communications Biology, these flies can be utilized to produce valuable materials including high-quality animal feed, lubricating oils, and biofuels in addition to being a way to dispose of waste. In addition, lowering the amount of organic waste in landfills ought to drastically lower methane emissions, a hazardous greenhouse gas that contributes to climate change.This study has the potential to significantly alter how waste management is thought about and move towards a far more sustainable future. The study's authors stated that "a significant worldwide concern is the management of organic waste. At the moment, 40–70% of organic waste is dumped in landfills, where it is compressed firmly to conserve space. This causes organic waste to be broken down by anaerobic microbiological processes, producing methane—a greenhouse gas (GHG) that is 28 times more powerful than carbon dioxide.Consequently, methane produced by landfilling organic waste is mostly to blame for the solid waste sector's projected 5% annual global contribution to CO2-equivalent emissions."  Methane from landfill waste releases us closer to a global catastrophe. The lead author of the report, Dr. Kate Tepper, told The Guardian, "We need to get that down to zero.".

According to Maselko, insects will be the "next frontier" in addressing the issue of waste management on Earth, which includes roughly 1 billion metric tonnes of food waste annually. With the exception of Antarctica, all continents are home to black soldier flies. "If you've got a compost bin, then you've probably got some," Maselko stated Like other insects, the larvae of flies may consume twice their body weight in food each day, and they are fed to animals. According to Maselko, flies are already capable of digesting garbage more quickly than bacteria.