Team:HKUST/Description
Description
“We need an alternative for the current synthetic fibers.”
“Why a new one?”
“In order to ease the microfiber and dyeing pollution.”
Microplastic Pollution
Synthetic fibers, similar to plastics, are man-made polymers derived from petrochemical stocks. Common synthetic fibers include nylon, acrylic, and spandex. They are intensively used by the textile and apparel industry due to their durability, resistance, and affordability. The use of synthetic fibers in the industry started to bloom in the mid-1900s, when nylon came to the sight of the public.
Annual global consumption of synthetic materials for apparel production has been 3-folded over the last two decades and is predicted that the trend will continue to rise in the foreseeable future.
Microfibers ── small pieces of fiber, is a class of microplastic. It accounts for more than 30% of primary microplastic in the hydrosphere. Every time clothes made with synthetic materials are put into the washing machine, fabrics rub and abrade, causing little fibril shedding off. It is estimated that more than 700,000 pieces of microfibers are produced per laundry [3], and 190,000 tons of them enter the ocean each year. Additional to washing, recent research shows that wearing the clothes only also releases more than 900 millions of microfibers to the atmosphere per person per year.
Identical to microplastics, once entered the ecosystem, they absorb chemical pollutants, like PCBs, DDTs, and PHAs, bioaccumulate within the organism, and magnify along the food chain. The high concentration of pollutants they soak up and the additives in the fabric, such as plasticizer for flexibility enhancement, can interfere with normal endocrine regulations and cause feeding and reproduction issues in fishes and humans. Due to the small size, they could be easily transported to different places, including remote polar regions, by ocean currents. Due to its widespread abundance, microfibers could be found in various products we often ingest.
Microfibers releasing into the air are also causing health issues. Airborn microfibers can be easily inhaled into our lungs. Typical for fibrils which length-to-diameter ratio is smaller than 3:1, they can effectively escape from the mucociliary clearance mechanisms of the respiratory system. Some microfibers are extremely durable, researchers found polypropylene, polyethylene and polycarbonates can stay in psychological fluids for a long period without dissolution and change to surface in vivo test [5]. The pointed edge of the microfibers could even poke cells. Currently, the problem of microfibers has become more intense due to the rising demand and consumption for clothes caused by the prevalence of the fast-fashion industry. Despite the worsening pollution condition, there is a lack of textile materials that could be fully biodegraded while possessing competent mechanical properties and affordable by the industry. Therefore, an alternative material to the current synthetic fiber is in need.
Dyeing pollution
The textiles and fashion industry is one of the most polluting businesses, contributing non-trivially to industrial pollution, particularly serious is the dyeing process.
The main detrimental problem the textile industry brings to the environment is the untreated effluents discharged into the water system. Different types of chemical dyes are applied when treating different types of fibers. Most of them do not bind tightly to the faber matrix and will be discharged directly to secluded rivers as sewage.
The coloration of the water body not only damages the aesthetic but also disturbs the ecosystem by preventing light from penetrating through, reducing primary productivity rate, increasing biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) and chemical oxygen demand (COD) for degrading the dyeing compound [7]. Ultimately producing anoxic zone and killing cornered organisms. Being extremely soluable in water, these dyes could hardly be removed by conventional water treatment methods. Besides, many of the abovementioned dyes are toxicants to aquatic organisms. They could be transformed into more dangerous compounds, such as cytotoxins, mutagens, and carcinogens, with the help of enzymes inside an organism.
Our Objectives
Our goal is to produce and promote a biodegradable textile material to reduce the reliance on the current synthetic polymers. We find great potential in hagfish slime threads’ amazing mechanical properties. Therefore, we hope to manufacture it as a novel proteinaceous textile material. Additionally, we also want to fuse chromoproteins on the subunits for coloring of the whole fiber. Through mixing subunits that are of different colors, we hope to explore an alternative to the highly polluting industrial dyes.
Effectiveness and the cost of manufacturing are also within our concerns. We work on the genetic circuit to boost expression efficiency in order to meet the high demand of proteins for fabrication. Besides, to maintain a reasonable cost of production, we searched for an innovative, and less expensive approach, when compared to traditional chromatography, for protein purification. Next, please see our project design!
References
[1] FAOUN, and ICAC, “World apparel fiber consumption survey,” 2013.
[2] T. Exchange, “Preferred Fiber & Materials Market Report 2020,” 2020.
[3] I. E. Napper and R. C. Thompson, “Release of synthetic microplastic plastic fibers from domestic washing machines: Effects of fabric type and washing conditions,” Marine Pollution Bulletin, vol. 112, no. 1-2, pp. 39–45, 2016.
[4] M. Kosuth, S. A. Mason, and E. V. Wattenberg, “Anthropogenic contamination of tap water, beer, and sea salt,” Plos One, vol. 13, no. 4, 2018.
[5]J. Gasperi, S. L. Wright, R. Dris, F. Collard, C. Mandin, M. Guerrouache, V. Langlois, F. J. Kelly, and B. Tassin, “Microplastics in air: Are we breathing it in?,” Current Opinion in Environmental Science & Health, vol. 1, pp. 1–5, 2018.
[6] H. Patel, “Charcoal as an adsorbent for textile wastewater treatment,” Separation Science and Technology, vol. 53, no. 17, pp. 2797–2812, 2018.
[7] B. Lellis, C. Z. Fávaro-Polonio, J. A. Pamphile, and J. C. Polonio, “Effects of textile dyes on health and the environment and bioremediation potential of living organisms,” Biotechnology Research and Innovation, vol. 3, no. 2, pp. 275–290, 2019.