Milk from Genetically-Modified "Spider-Goats" is Source of Valuable Silk

Milk from Genetically-Modified "Spider-Goats" is Source of Valuable Silk

Top of Mind with Julie Rose

Sliding or Deciding, Goat Silk, Saving Asian Elephants

Episode: Sliding or Deciding, Goat Silk, Saving Asian Elephants

  • Feb 7, 2019 11:00 pm
  • 18:18 mins

Guest: Justin Jones Spider silk is stronger than steel, super lightweight and surprisingly elastic. If we could make it in bulk, it it’d be great for everything from parachutes and sports gear to replacement tendons and ligaments. Which is why the US Navy has been investing for years in a lab at Utah State University that’s figured out how to coax the building blocks of spider silk out of goats and alfalfa and even E. coli bacteria.

Other Segments

The Hair Industry's Dark Side

13m

(Originally aired October 10, 2018) Guest: Dan Choi, Founder and Owner of Remy New York Human hair is a billion-dollar industry globally–and we’re not talking about styling or coloring it. We’re just talking about the buying and selling of hair itself. When a Hollywood star suddenly grows luxurious long locks overnight, it’s thanks to extensions made of real human hair cut off someone else’s head. The trouble is that even the fanciest salons don’t really know where the extensions and wigs they’re using have come from. Common unethical sourcing practices include collecting hair from barbershop floors and exploiting desperately poor women in Asia and India. Entrepreneur Dan Choi’s aims to set a “fair trade standard” for hair. His company is called Remy New York and he commonly pays women five or ten times what a typical hair trader would for their ponytail

(Originally aired October 10, 2018) Guest: Dan Choi, Founder and Owner of Remy New York Human hair is a billion-dollar industry globally–and we’re not talking about styling or coloring it. We’re just talking about the buying and selling of hair itself. When a Hollywood star suddenly grows luxurious long locks overnight, it’s thanks to extensions made of real human hair cut off someone else’s head. The trouble is that even the fanciest salons don’t really know where the extensions and wigs they’re using have come from. Common unethical sourcing practices include collecting hair from barbershop floors and exploiting desperately poor women in Asia and India. Entrepreneur Dan Choi’s aims to set a “fair trade standard” for hair. His company is called Remy New York and he commonly pays women five or ten times what a typical hair trader would for their ponytail