Spider Silk: Nature's Marvelous Material
Sakshi Kaith*
ICAR-Indian Institute of Agricultural Biotechnology, Ranchi, Jharkhand (834 003), India
Shubham Loat
ICAR-National Research Centre on Yak, Dirang, Arunachal Pradesh (790 101), India
K.K. Kanaka
ICAR-Indian Institute of Agricultural Biotechnology, Ranchi, Jharkhand (834 003), India
Amit Kumar
ICAR-Indian Institute of Agricultural Biotechnology, Ranchi, Jharkhand (834 003), India
Suryakant Manik
ICAR-Indian Institute of Agricultural Biotechnology, Ranchi, Jharkhand (834 003), India
DOI: https://doi.org/10.54083/BRT/7.1.2025/21-23
Keywords: Biodegradability, Biomaterials, Recombinant protein, Sustainability
Abstract
Spider silk is considered as nature’s stronger biomaterial known to science with properties like strength (stronger than Kelvar), elasticity (flexible than rubber) and completely biodegradable, making its versatility in wider applications. With advanced technologies in genetic engineering, we can now recreate spider silk in labs using bacteria or other organisms, but producing the spider silk at large scale has always been a challenge until now. Imagine ecofriendly body armor, wear-resistant lightweight clothing, biodegradable bottles or sutures that gets completely dissolve in body. Spider silk even holds the potential to grow artificial nerves, tendons or ligaments, skin regeneration and 3D cell scaffolding, making it a valuable material for 3D bioprinting and advanced biomedical applications. As science getting equipped with optimized and new analytical tool, spider silk acting as one of the agents to transform biomedical and material science.
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Reference
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