Litter to Leaf: The Unexplored Potential of Silk Byproducts

Cellphone-Aided Attomolar Zinc Ion Detection Using Silkworm Protein-Based Nanointerface Engineering in a Plasmon-Coupled Dequenched Emission Platform

“…Although biorefinery-based solutions in this direction are underway, the utility of such waste products in advanced photonic research is rare. Importantly, the silkworm pupae generated inevitably during the production of silk are discarded as wastes, although it has a nutritional value. − The estimates indicate that the quantity of such byproducts are much larger than silk, also known as “queen of fibers” . For silk textile-based applications, during the extraction procedure, the silkworms are killed to collect the silk fibers.…”

“…These silkworms that are discarded as waste are known as spent worms and contain 30–40% proteins in addition to oil and carbohydrates. The cost of proteins in biomedical applications as preferred biopolymers (over polysaccharides) is on the rise, but limited due to their availability, thereby re-emphasizing the need to revisit byproducts as a novel alternative protein source . Although other byproducts of silk industry such as chitin, oil, gum, lipid, litter, and sericin are being explored in biorefinery platforms for different applications, the study of silkworm protein (SWP) is in the embryonic stage.…”

“…The fivefold contribution of this research work based on the abovementioned objectives are as follows: Demonstration of the utility of low-cost silkworm pupae that are otherwise discarded as a waste byproduct in silk industries. A simple alkali-based method was used for the extraction of SWPs from spent silkworm pupae. , In this purview, the extracted SWP serves as a biocompatible source for several applications concerning antimicrobials and biobased products. Synthesis of novel nanomaterials using green chemistry principles for sustainable development in nanotechnology. Here, homometallic AgNPs and AuNPs and heterometallic AgAu nanohybrids were engineered based on SWPs, using UV irradiation as the only external source of energy.…”

“…Demonstration of the utility of low-cost silkworm pupae that are otherwise discarded as a waste byproduct in silk industries. A simple alkali-based method was used for the extraction of SWPs from spent silkworm pupae. , In this purview, the extracted SWP serves as a biocompatible source for several applications concerning antimicrobials and biobased products.…”

Biomedical applications of silkworm ( Bombyx Mori ) proteins in regenerative medicine (a narrative review)

“…As before mentioned, silk consists of two types of self-assembled proteins (Figure 1): fibroin (75% of silk protein; Sun et al, 2019) and sericin (25%-30% of silk proteins; Reddy et al, 2020;Shang et al, 2013), and other minor components include wax, fat, pigments, and mineral components produced by the silkworm B. Mori (Mitraki & van Raaij, 2005;Yavuz et al, 2019). Silk fibroins, containing more than 5000 amino acids and form a β-sheet secondary structure, are embedded in an amorphous matrix, composed of alanine, glycine, and serine in the form of recurrent amino acid sequences determining the structural and mechanical properties of silk fibers (Fu et al, 2015;Gasperini et al, 2014).…”