Natural polymers for emerging technological applications: cellulose, lignin, shellac and silk

Abstract

In an effort to stave off the growth of electronic waste (e-waste) that poses a critical environmental dilemma, scientists often look into nature as an unending inspirational pool of materials and chemical processes that ensure functionality, performance and safe dissolution at the end of life cycle. This short review highlights only four organic polymer materials of natural origin (i.e. cellulose, lignin, shellac and silk) from the very large pool of natural (bio)polymeric materials and looks not only into the recent developments at the industrial scale but also into the emerging niche applications of these materials, while highlighting their implementation into electronics and sensor development. This review exemplifies that natural polymeric materials have great potential for the development of eco-friendly electronics, in other words the class of industrial products that has carefully considered the important issues of biocompatibility, biodegradability (even compostability), cost of production and energy expanded in production (i.e. the carbon footprint). © 2024 The Author(s). Polymer International published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of Society of Chemical Industry.