Very interesting. Perhaps the article should be titled "boy discovers conditions under which bacteria eat plastic". It still seems like introducing the new bacteria into the environment would be pointless, though. If the conditions in the landfill are left as they are now, I imagine the new bacteria would evolve back into what is presently optimal. If we modify the conditions, these new strains of bacteria would evolve on their own anyway... I guess I am assuming there are no local nash equilibria in the competition between different strains.