According to the impending EU regulations, all polymer products used in agriculture and applied into soil must be biodegradable to prevent their accumulation in the environment. However, some of these products must serve their purpose for months up to years before their degradation and mineralization is desirable. Current international standards describing the biodegradability in soil are more directed towards materials that undergo relatively fast biodegradation, which hampers the development and certification of slowly biodegrading polymeric materials. Here, an accelerated soil biodegradation test is proposed, where by increasing the incubation temperature from 25 °C to 37 °C, up to about 4-fold increase in the biodegradation rate is achieved. The polymers tested include TÜV AUSTRIA Belgium certified polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA), polybutylene succinate (PBS), polybutylene adipate-terephthalate and polylactic acid blend (PBAT/PLA) and an experimental polyester network (ICL-PN). The biodegradation rates of the given polymers at the two temperatures was examined by carbon dioxide evolution. Independent testing was done in two independent laboratories and the results were compared. The biodegradation of the materials was further assessed by electron microscopy and the microbial community present was analyzed by next-generation sequencing. Criteria were proposed for the accelerated test method, which include that the polymers eligible for the accelerated test should not manifest any phase transition, like e.g. a glass transition, in the interval from 25 °C to 37 °C. The proposed accelerated test can be helpful in the development of polymeric materials with a functional life of several years and with ultimately quantitative biodegradability.

根据即将颁布的欧盟法规，所有用于农业和土壤中的聚合物产品都必须是可生物降解的，以防止其在环境中积累。但是，其中某些产品必须在长达数月甚至数年的时间内达到其用途，然后才能进行降解和矿化。当前描述土壤中生物可降解性的国际标准更多地针对经历相对快速生物降解的材料，这阻碍了缓慢生物降解聚合物材料的开发和认证。在此，提出了加速的土壤生物降解试验，其中通过将孵化温度从25°C升高到37°C，生物降解速率最多可提高约4倍。测试的聚合物包括TÜVAUSTRIA Belgium认证的聚羟基链烷酸酯（PHA），聚丁二酸丁二酸酯（PBS），聚己二酸对苯二甲酸丁二醇酯和聚乳酸混合物（PBAT / PLA）和实验性聚酯网络（ICL-PN）。通过二氧化碳逸出检查了给定聚合物在两个温度下的生物降解速率。在两个独立的实验室中进行了独立测试，并对结果进行了比较。通过电子显微镜进一步评估了材料的生物降解，并通过下一代测序分析了存在的微生物群落。提出了用于加速试验方法的标准，该标准包括适于加速试验的聚合物在25℃至37℃的间隔内不应表现出任何相变，例如玻璃化转变。