Artificial silk could be the bee's knees

William Atkins
Thursday, 04 February 2010 01:06

Science - Biology

Australian scientists are striving to make artificial honeybee silk. And, if they accomplish it, human-made insect silk would be made into tough and lightweight products such as textiles, aircraft composites, and artificial tendons.



Australian entomologist Tara D. Sutherland is a CSIRO scientist, along with being the head of its Biomaterials team at CSIRO Entomology. She is also an expert in biomaterials, insect toxicology, genetics, and bioreme diation.

Dr. Sutherland thinks that honeybee silk is the Bee's Knees, as her team makes inroads in the eventual production of artificially produced insect silk.

For those of you unfamiliar with the term “Bee’s Knees,” it means something of the highest quality, such as the comment: "Wow, that's the bee's knees!"

Dr. Sutherland and her CSIRO team (Sarah Weisman, Victoria S. Haritos, Jeffrey S. Church, Mickey G. Huson, Stephen T. Mudie, Andrew J.W. Rodgers, and Geoff J. Dumsday) have accomplished an important step in the eventual production of artificial bee silk.

Production of human-made insect silk is important, which is why its production is being attempted all over the world by various groups of scientist.

The CSIRO (Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation) team used recombinant cells of bacterium Escherichia coli (often abbreviated E.coli) to produce the silk proteins.

The silk proteins were then self-assembled into silk-like structures, similar to silk produced by the honey bee (Apis mellifera).

Page two continues with information on the process of making honeybee silk, along with comments from Dr. Sutherland.