USU researchers one step closer to mass production of synthetic silk

A recent discovery has brought a team of Utah State University researchers closer to its goal of bringing biologically engineered spider silk products to market in the near future.

The discovery — a more efficient way of spinning silk fibers created in a number of organisms — is a major breakthrough for the team of undergraduate and graduate students led by science technology and research professor Randy Lewis.

The team presented some materials made from the silk at a Community Night event held by the engineering department on Thursday evening at the Taggart Student Center.

Lewis said the new solution also eliminates the high costs that are associated with the organic compounds.

“When it comes to commercialization, everything is about cost,” said Justin Jones, who is a senior research assistant and lab manager at Lewis’ lab. Jones also said the solution makes the research attainable and production costs more reasonable.

Lewis and his team have been researching ways to reproduce spider silk’s properties using hosts of E. coli bacteria, transgenic alfalfa, silkworms and goats, according to the USU Synthetic Bioproducts Center. Lewis said the synthetic silk can be adapted to be used in medical devices, sportswear, climbing rope and even bicycle tires.

According to Lewis, another big advancement for the research was the discovery of a way to significantly increase the amount of protein produced per bacteria. Dong Chen, a research associate professor at USU, developed the methods. Lewis’ team is working on combining Chen’s efforts with its own to increase the protein even further.

Research is still being done to produce the spider silk proteins more efficiently.  

“We need prototypes before anything can be tested,” Lewis said.

The emphasis of the continued research is on the bacterial production of the silk. According to Jones, it is more common in pharmaceutical companies to use that method in human subjects. “And it’s reasonably cheap,” he said.

According to Jones, the team’s members have been very pleased with these new developments and feel they have come a long way.

“Before a month ago, we had big dreams,” Jones said. “Now it’s becoming a reality very quickly.”

Amanda Grover, Heather Shulsen, Rebecca Wheatley, Lindsey Hall and Jared Dangerfield contributed to this article.