Hagfish Slime Fashion

Hagfish Slime Fashion

Posted: July 16, 2015

What will the clothing of the future be made of? How about slime?

I’m Anna Rothschild and this is Gross Science.

Hagfish are eel-like creatures that live on the ocean floor. They’re ancient animals that don’t have backbones, or scales, or even jaws. What they do have is slime—and lots of it. When they’re attacked they can release about a liter of slime, which clogs the mouths and gills of their assailants, making them unable to breathe.

The slime is composed of two parts. There’s mucus and thread-like fibers. And these fibers are special—they’re thin and act a bit like super-strong silk. So scientists think they could be a candidate for the next eco-friendly, high-performance clothing material.

You see, common high-performance fibers, like Nylon and Spandex, are made from petroleum. But hagfish thread is made of proteins, which would make it a great, renewable alternative if we could find a way to mass produce it sustainably.

The issue is that hagfish don’t breed in captivity, so we can’t set up hagfish farms where we could harvest large quantities of their thread. (Which, I know, would have been really awesome.) Instead, scientists are hoping to genetically engineer other organisms, like bacteria, to produce the fibers.

Now, you won’t be seeing hagfish slime clothing anytime soon, but the researchers think that one day we might have hagfish stockings, or bullet proof vests, or maybe hagfish yoga pants. And personally I can’t wait for a future where I could workout in the slime of an ancient sea creature.

Ew.

PRODUCTION CREDITS:

Host, Writer, Animator, Editor

Anna Rothschild

DP, Sound

Elizabeth Gillis

Many thanks to Dr. Douglas Fudge.

A Little Mischief b

Music Provided by APM

IMAGES

Hagfish Defense Mechanism Footage

© Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa

Photographs of slime and fibers

Anna Rothschild/©WGBH Educational Foundation

Nylonstockings

Wikimedia Commons/Antique Rose

Aerobic exercise – public demonstration12

Wikimedia Commons/ShinyFan

Pumpjacks

Wikimedia Commons/Arne Hückelheim

Straw hat, Vietnamese Women’s Museum

Wikimedia Commons/Vietnamese Women’s Museum

SFX

Cockroaches

Freesound/StateAardvark
(used with permission from author)

Squeak Pack/squeak_10

Freesound/Corsica_S

Produced by WGBH for PBS Digital Studios

IMAGE

(main image: Hagfish)

©WGBH Educational Foundation 2015

Want more info?

More on hagfish slime from the Fudge Lab at the University of Guelph:
http://comparativephys.ca/fudgelab/project/about-hagfishes/