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It's a little disappointing you couldn't say anything, but thanks for checking anyway! Every little bit of info helps paint a bigger picture of what's going on.
That would be awesome! Try to get some pictures if you can, I would love to see the progress. All I have right now is a several-month-old satellite image from just after they started breaking ground.
Meet the Transgenic Silkworms That Are Spinning out Spider Silk
http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/50399/title/Meet-the-Transgenic-Silkworms-That-Are-Spinning-out-Spider-Silk/
Researchers explore genetic engineering to produce super-tough fibers.
By Catherine Offord | October 1, 2017
In Jon Rice's office is a small incubator full of tiny insect eggs—one of many such incubators kept at Kraig Biocraft Laboratories (KBL), the Michigan-based polymer development company where Rice is chief operations officer. From these eggs will hatch tiny silkworms, caterpillars of the domesticated silk moth Bombyx mori, which will then set to chomping down on mulberry leaves and preparing themselves for the demanding task of spinning silk cocoons to pupate in just a few weeks later.
But these are no ordinary silkworms, a fact you might notice “if you know what you’re looking for,” Rice says. For a start, “the eyes and the feet of our silkworms glow, if you look at them under the right UV filter,” he explains. And the cocoons the silkworms later produce “have a slight greenish hue.”
The glow comes courtesy of a fluorescent protein used as a marker to confirm that several genes for spider-silk proteins have been successfully edited into the silkworm genome. Unlike regular domestic silkworms, which are reared in teeming millions around the world to spin fibers for use in clothing and furnishings, KBL’s stock is raised to produce what the company hopes may be one of the toughest fibers on earth.
Combining strength comparable to that of steel with an elasticity per weight that rivals rubber’s, spider silks have some of the highest measures of toughness—a reflection of the energy needed to break the material—of any fiber out there, beating the sturdiest man-made fibers such as nylon or Kevlar several times over. “Spider silk is unique,” Rice says. “We can’t recreate that synthetically.” Researchers have long touted uses for such a material in varied applications, including parachute cords, high-performance sportswear, and, thanks to spider silk’s unusual biocompatibility, suture thread.
However, obtaining silk from spiders presents a considerable challenge. For a start, spiders’ webs consist of multiple types of silk—not all of which have desirable mechanical properties. Worse, “spiders have two personality defects,” explains Randy Lewis, director of the Synthetic Bioproducts Center at Utah State University, and one of the inventors of the first spider silk–spinning transgenic silkworm. “They’re both cannibalistic and territorial. Unlike silkworms, where you just throw a bunch of them in, and they eat and keep perfectly happy, spiders want to have a certain amount of room and will kill to keep that room.”
Consequently, the last few decades have seen multiple attempts to take live spiders out of the equation. At KBL, “we think the silkworm approach is the best way forward,” Rice says. “Silkworms make silk. That aspect is fully understood. The only challenge we have is changing the recipe.” The company has created 20 transgenic lines of silkworms that spin cocoons containing spider silk proteins. Dragon Silk, one of the latest products made from the fibers of these cocoons, is stronger than steel and tougher, lighter, and more flexible than Kevlar (though it has slightly lower tensile strength than this synthetic fiber). The company now holds a million-dollar contract with the US Army, which is exploring possible uses in defensive clothing and other gear.
But some researchers point out that the transgenic silkworm approach has its own pitfalls. “Silkworms and spiders do make silk in different ways,” says Karolinska Institute silk researcher Janne Johansson. Silkworms spin thicker fibers than arachnids do, and add their own proteins in addition to the fibers themselves. For example, their silk contains a protein called sericin, a gluey substance that sticks fibers together in the cocoon, Johansson says. “You need to treat silk from Bombyx before you use it for anything.”
The internal spinning machinery differs between the two organisms too. In a spider’s silk gland, unspun silk, or “dope,” passes through a pH gradient, gradually being exposed to more-acidic conditions that help silk proteins aggregate. Silkworms also have a pH gradient, “but it’s less pronounced,” Johansson says. “To the extent that spider silk proteins are optimized for experiencing this more extensive pH gradient in the spider silk gland, it will not work [the same way] in the silkworm.”
Several research groups have turned to other organisms to produce spider silk proteins. Lewis’s group made headlines in the 2000s with the creation of transgenic goats whose milk contained large quantities of silk proteins usually made by the arachnids. Other approaches include the creation of transgenic tobacco plants, potato, alfalfa, yeast, and biology’s go-to bacterium, E. coli, which is “simple, easy, and cheap to scale up,” says Thomas Scheibel, a biomaterials researcher at the University of Bayreuth in Germany. “It’s a nice system.”
Of course, without a spinning host, researchers have to spin the silk themselves. After tweaking the proportion of silk proteins expressed in E. coli, Scheibel’s group recently used wet-spinning—drawing fibers from silk proteins that have been allowed to self-assemble in a bath of water and alcohol—to make fibers with a toughness comparable to that of natural spider silk, albeit with lower tensile strength (Adv Mater, 27:2189-94, 2015).
And earlier this year, Johansson, along with Karolinska Institute collaborator Anna Rising, published an approach that mimics pH changes in a spider through what Johansson calls “an almost embarrassingly simple setup.” After keeping a highly concentrated solution of E. coli–produced recombinant silk proteins at pH 7.5, “we pump it through a narrow capillary and out into a beaker filled with buffer solution at pH 5,” he says. “That turns it almost instantaneously into a silk fiber that we can reel up.” The result is the toughest artificial spider silk fiber so far (Nat Chem Biol, 13:262-64, 2017).
At this rate, scaled-up, cheap production of reliably tough, recombinant silk fibers may be only a few years away. “We feel pretty good about it,” Lewis says. “Do we have the same properties as spider silk? No. Are we close? Yes.” The key now, as many researchers see it, will be finding the right applications for these fibers once they’re made. “You have to look for, ‘Where does silk give us the boost?’” says Scheibel, whose spinout company AMSilk also works on non-fiber spider silk applications, such as biocompatible coatings for silicone breast implants and 3-D–printed scaffolds for biofabrication. “Not just, ‘I make a product because I can do it.’”
Lewis agrees. “The unique property of spider silk is a combination of elasticity and strength,” he says, adding that many purported applications are likely to add little value by incorporating the fibers. “I guarantee you I can make a bulletproof vest—it’s just going to stop the bullet on the wrong side of your chest. If you just want strength, use Kevlar.”
The exif data from that image shows that the picture was taken back in May. Also, the image is identical to the one used in their Facebook post of the May PR stating that they delivered DS samples to the Army (https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1507031479368855&id=835004733238203).
Based on that, I believe that that picture is simply the thread that was sent directly to the Army that netted the rest of the $900k contract and the shipment to Warwick and elsewhere is something that they have produced since then.
Thank you and jetow! I hope it pays off for all of us. I am looking forward to seeing the day that I can buy spider silk products right off the shelf, ideally with the profits made off KBLB.
You are welcome! I have been doing well. Been pretty busy with a new baby, so I haven't been able to keep up with this forum, but I still like to pop in from time to time and see what is going on and comment with any info I find if I think it can be helpful.
It was extended since KBLB could not meet the original deadline. It should end on 8/22/17 now.
According to Twitter, they just started shipping them.
You going to Da Nang? The new Vietnam worm farm will be just southwest of the city in Dai Hiep, so you might want to scope out that area if you get the chance.
I agree, Vietnam is a must at this point. Kim needs to produce and sell, the stock price depends on it. Whatever deal is made will likely be good for KBLB in the short term, but in the long run if Kim wants to remain in business, he needs to ensure that he is protected in the case of disaster or trickery and ensure that operations can continue. This is a revolutionary technology and Kim needs to use his lawyering skills to protect it from it getting plucked out of his hands while at the same time ensuring that shareholders remain confident in the ability for the company to grow. It is a fine line to walk, but i believe will cause KBLB to soar to great heights if successful.
I agree, GT did get greedy. They saw the opportunity that Apple brought to them and were eager to get in bed with them in good faith to grow their company. But honestly, I believe that GT was tricked by Apple so that Apple could get control of the sapphire IP. I just see parallels with what happened with them and what is going on with KBLB.
If Kim agrees to finance though Vietnam with their IP as collateral, that would put them on the hook to potentially be bamboozled just as GT was. But, as long as Kim lawyers like he should know how to do and sets up a separate subsidiary and has them on the hook for the financing with KBLB, simply licencing the worms to the subsidiary, then if things in Vietnam go south, they might be able to escape without too much damage, maybe.
KBLB is a tiny company with enormous potential. Kim has been very careful to come out of everything without owing anybody anything and, while that does have disadvantages, they are much less likely to be run through the ringer like GT was. Unfortunately, with the time and effort that has been spent on focusing on Vietnam, i think that Kim has much more to lose. Because of this, it is all to easy for Vietnam to take advantage of him and make a deal that requires Kim to put something on the line such as IP. The alternative of walking away might plunge the stock price to levels so low that current financing would be worthless anyway, so he might not have much choice at this point.
As I said before, Vietnam is just starting to emerge on the global stage and work with international companies, so I don't think they will intentionally deceive Kim since that would set a bad precedent, but i still feel that any initial agreement that is made there will ultimately benefit Vietnam more than KBLB. I think it will allow a foothold to make more lucrative deals for the company in the future, but that is still far off.
It seems that Vietnam is trying to entice companies to invest in them and utilize their labor force to show that they can be a good asset on the global stage. Because of that, i really don't think that Vietnam will intentionally bamboozle KBLB, but Mojo does have a point. The risk is there. The more eggs that Kim puts in the Vietnam basket, the more will be lost if things go downhill in that region. As Mojo mentioned, a lot depends on the financing agreements and terms of doing business with Vietnam.
You mentioned that you wanted an example of how a smaller company dependent on a larger established entity can be ruined by the larger entity? I present GT Advanced Technologies (GTAT). They were originally a solar panel developer, but also worked in making tempered glass, specifically sapphire glass. Apple (AAPL) reached out to them with a too-good-to-be-true offer for upfront financing that can be paid off over 5 years to build a very large factory to produce sapphire glass in bulk to supply Apple for electronics such as their new iPhone 6 that was upcoming at the time, the revenue of which would pay off the financing. Well, at the last minute, Apple decided not to use the sapphire glass in the phone after all and went with gorilla glass, leaving GTAT with a lot of now worthless product made specifically to Apple's specs. GTAT had no way to make enough revenue without Apple purchasing their product since they had projected Apple sales to be 60-80% of all of their sales, so they were unable to make the financing payments, so they declared chapter 11 bankruptcy. Their stock was cancelled without shareholder payout, their assets were mostly liquidated, and their intellectual property was forfeited to Apple to forgive the financing debt. Apple now can make their own sapphire glass legally with GTAT's technology without paying them a cent. It is this sort of situation that I really do not want to happen between KBLB and Vietnam.
Supposedly, it is Kim's middle name.
The issue is with how the proteins are being spun into fiber.
Spiders use a very intricate spinneret that actually expands and contracts, removing and adding moisture as needed in order to spin their protein dope into a strong fiber.
From what I understand (and if anyone knows better, correct me if I am wrong), the labs currently use a fixed spigot in the wet spinning process or a consistent current in electrospinning that is not really able to monitor the silk proteins during the spinning process, so it creates inconsistencies in the fiber due to natural impurities and differences in concentration. The protein chain is only as strong as its weakest link.
Now, technology will advance and, i believe, will overcome this obstacle. Specifically, i know that Sweedish based Spiber Technologies AB is looking into it (Source), but currently, the more "natural" production method of transgenic silkworms that are able to control their spinnerets similar to spiders will produce higher strength properties than the protein based methods.
Here is an article that goes into a bit more detail about it.
Yeah, I am looking forward to getting my hands on that as well. Maybe a Moon Parka and some Adidas AMSilk shoes as well. I want a full collection and maybe open my own museum exhibit someday.
Ah, ok, I would have thought it would have been sent express mail or something.
That is just it, it is a collector's item. The first affordable synthetic spider silk textile spun from proteins. I want it just to have it.
Anyone get their tie yet? If you feel underwhelmed with it, I am interested in buying it off you.
Wow, I am sorry I asked to see the email. I did not know it would result in you losing your opportunity to buy the tie.
Thanks, abom! You planning on getting it?
No, still waiting on mine...lucky...
What does the e-mail say?
He doesn't see even the other transgenic silkworm based spider silk companies as a potential threat? Granted they are quite a ways behind and lack proper funding, but they could still eventually catch up.
I agree, Spidey Tek's claims definately seem fishy. I looked into them three months ago when they made their announcement and discussed it with an engineer and many things just don't add up. It has been discussed on this board before, but here is what i got on them:
The article quotes wrong tensile strength numbers (400 Mpa) for carbon fiber (4300 MPa is apparently possible), 1240 MPa for CFRP. They also repeat the 400 MPa claim at the end of the technology section on their website.
They also seem to not understand the point of using carbon fiber. There are stronger fibers than carbon fiber, indeed, Zylon, Dyneema and Kevlar are all stronger than carbon fiber, but carbon fiber is still what is used to make cars and airplanes and the reason for this is that what matters is modulus, i.e. stiffness. Indeed, carbon fiber has 3.36 times the weight specific modulus of Dyneema and 7.4 times higher Young's modulus.
He cites 4,000 MPa as spider silk strength, but the strongest spider silk fiber, the dragline of the Darwin Bark Spider, isn't much more than 2,000 MPa. I can't imagine him getting even close to that level of strength unless he mixes them with some other stronger materials. I simply don't think it is possible otherwise, especially with the standard "wet spinning" process that they claim to be using on their website.
40,000 MPa is almost as strong as a individual carbon nanotubes. You can't expect people to believe that protein is that strong. Even the production of a protein 1/10 that strong, even if you could only make a piece as a large as a human hair, would merit a paper in Nature.
Looking into them a bit more, it seems to be a company that has only been around for a little over a year. The CEO is Roberto Velozzi, a design engineer who has (according to his LinkedIn) had past experience working with NASA and, more recently, Bayer while reserching carbon nanotubes until they were no longer commercially viable and offloaded to another company.
The addition of nanotubes to resins can improve the properties of the resulting composites, especially, I think, with regard to toughness, but this is fairly conventional and it is done commercially. Graphene also works and HEAD has a strange patent for the use of graphene reinforced composites in sports equipment. However, it is possible to buy prepregs where the epoxy has carbon nanotubes and graphene added, for example, from Zyvex Technologies. I suspect that multi-walled carbon nanotubes could well offer further improvements, which I imagine is why FutureCarbon bought the stuff.
It seems he is still working with high tech materials and focusing a lot on marketing his supercar, the Velozzi. I imagine that this new material, if it exists, will be used in this and other concept cars/drones of his design.
I cannot find any patents for anything that he claims, domestic or international. He claims that it is patented, so maybe it is not yet public? He does own trademarks, though.
All in all, with the poor design of his websites, lack of cited sources for information, incorrect or misleading stated values for known substances, lack of collaborative experts in biotechnology helping him, lack of personal experience in biotech, lack of time spent working on developing spider silks, and over the top claims of strength properties in an application where strength would not be a good application for the fibers, I am extremely skeptical of their claims and would not but much faith on what they state.
The label on their tie states otherwise, true or not: https://www.instagram.com/p/BRe_RLhFS4V/
Thanks for the input, Jazz! While you may not have as much first hand experience in microbiology, I value your input on these subjects since you can wrap your head around the technical aspects of gene editing and what is possible with it. It is good to get a second opinion to validate what i have understood from what has been said.
While I have an interest in the subject, i still find myself breaking out a dictionary to decipher some of the more technical terms and still have trouble visualizing it due to my lack of formal education and experience. Wikipedia can only teach so much, unfortunately.
They only briefly mentioned it with goats in that it takes too long for their life cycle. They were more trying to answer questions about their project which was on E.coli spider silks. Here is the web page for it. They worked in collaboration with Bolt Threads briefly and this was a while ago when not much was known about them, so I was more fishing for info about them and what makes their yeast derived silk better than the bacteria based ones that they gave up on a few years prior.
Yes, i remember the discussion on that and that is a good point, but I don't think it applies to Bolt Thread's yeast, only the other "goo" producer's bacteria. I remember reading a scientific article a while back that stated that Japan was able to figure out a way to somehow fold or truncate their gene sequence to allow it to fit in their bacteria. A lot of it went over my head and I can't seem to find it again to post, but it looked like they had at least a partial solution.
Both Threads, on the other hand, I don't think has that issue. My discussions with the student that was working with them game me an inside look at why they chose yeast. Here is a direct quote from them as to why they said yeast is better than bacteria for protein creation:
There is a right way and a wrong way to do this. I have seen too many times where someone's poorly put together webpage or poorly worded comment actually gave a convincing argument not to invest in KBLB. Quoting wrong information or misinformation that is sometimes circulated on this board in the form of speculation only harms the company's image in the long run.
As TRUTH pointed out in his post #118478, Bolt Thread's CEO did mention silkworms in the Q&A session at the end of the presentation and simply stated that it was the exceptionally long time that it takes for a silkworm to grow, mature, and lay eggs to verify if the gene insertion did the job that they desired and passed on to the offspring that prevented them from going the silkworm route. They did briefly give a shout out to "other companies in this space working on wood to leather to spider silk" along with words of encouragement to every company working on these sustainable fabrics. I have been following him for a while and he does seem legitimately concerned about the environment with a desire to change the world, so I do think that encouragement is genuine. To meet that with hostility and comments like "KBLB's silk is stronger, so take your ugly, expensive goo tie and stuff it in your tie hole" would reflect extremely poorly wherever it is stated.
Kim chose to take the silkworm route. This route takes longer and is harder to forge, but we shareholders chose to support him in his endeavor. While other companies like Bolt Threads, AMSilk, and Spiber that use protein based technology can pass up KBLB and have products on the shelf sooner because of their shortened timelines as a result of the relatively shorter microbial lifespans, they are still limited on the strength properties of their fibers until they can figure out how to replicate and surpass the natural spinnerets that spiders have. As far as I know, that has yet to happen. If and when it does is when I bet Kim will start making the move to protein based fibers. Hopefully this will be after he starts making a profit and has products on the shelf. In the meantime, his hands are tied with red tape from Vietnam.
They seem to be doing a lot of marketing as well, hiring celebrities to showcase their product:
https://ties.boltthreads.com/Dress-Code-DNA-from-Bolt-Threads.pdf
It is an artist, Jalila Essaïdi, that runs that company. She has worked with spider silks a bit in the past and was behind some of the bulletproof skin hype for a while. I don't think that she has much to do with KBLB, but she is connected to Randy Lewis.
True, I based the 2-3 tons estimate on a pure mulberry diet from trees grown on that land. If they are giving them additional feed from mulberry purchased elsewhere or an artificial diet, then they would be able to produce much more.
No problem, glad to provide the fruits of my research.
I agree with you on Kim's purchase of the land. I was concerned about KBLB leasing land like this since a greedy landowner might jack up the rent substantially after the trees mature and the company grows dependent on it or decide to end the lease suddenly due to various personal reasons. This way, we can be assured that it will stay in control of KBLB well into the future.
I am not local, but I can set up a news alert for the local area that will let me know when major events occur and I can monitor various satellite feeds that update periodically for anything that might not have made the news.
Well, the GPS coordinates from the photo point to this property and the public county tax records state that it is in Kim's name, purchased on 12-22-2016 with the KBLB office as the home of record with only 1 acre zoned as homestead and the other 14 as pasture. That site just has not been updated and only shows the homestead.
Kitchen sink? I believe pictures from this site has that: http://www.har.com/213-lcr-661/sold_73892104