Plastic bags are a global problem. Annually, some one trillion of them are used around the world, and fewer than 5 percent are actually recycled. This means a massive buildup of waste, litter, and chemical toxins in the environment. Material engineering professor Nicola Everitt, from The University of Nottingham in the U.K., thinks she might have the solution: Shrimp shells. For the past year, Everitt has been working to turn crushed up crustacean shells into biodegradable plastic bags so that they can be used in Egypt, a country with a severely inadequate waste disposal system. Right now, she and the team in Egypt are working to optimize the Chitosan extraction process, which takes about three days to complete. If the team is successful in Egypt, Everitt plans to explore production in other countries where there is a similar abundance of shrimp shell waste, like Thailand.