The use of renewable resources in composite materials is a vital strategy for enhancing sustainability in material science. Wool fibers are promising due to their unique properties, including thermal insulation and self-extinguishing characteristics. However, a substantial portion of wool is deemed unsuitable for textiles and is often discarded as waste. This review investigates the integration of wool fibers into polymer composites, aiming to improve sustainability and material performance. By analyzing recent advancements, this study highlights the potential of wool fibers to enhance the mechanical, thermal, and acoustic properties of composites. The findings support the development of eco-friendly materials that contribute to waste reduction and promote sustainable practices across various industries.

Pulsed electromagnetic field (PEMF) has drawn attention as a potential tool to improve the ability of bone biomaterials to integrate into the surrounding tissue. We investigated the effects of PEMF (frequency, 75 Hz; magnetic induction amplitude, 2 mT; pulse duration, 1.3 ms) on human osteoblast-like cells (SAOS-2) seeded onto wool keratin scaffolds in terms of proliferation, differentiation, and production of the calcified bone extracellular matrix. The wool keratin scaffold offered a 3D porous architecture for cell guesting and nutrient diffusion, suggesting its possible use as a filler to repair bone defects. Here, the combined approach of applying a daily PEMF exposure with additional osteogenic factors stimulated the cells to increase both the deposition of bone-related proteins and calcified matrix onto the wool keratin scaffolds. Also, the presence of SAOS-2 cells, or PEMF, or osteogenic factors did not influence the compression behavior or the resilience of keratin scaffolds in wet conditions. Besides, ageing tests revealed that wool keratin scaffolds were very stable and showed a lower degradation rate compared to commercial collagen sponges. It is for these reasons that this tissue engineering strategy, which improves the osteointegration properties of the wool keratin scaffold, may have a promising application for long term support of bone formation in vivo.

Nanocellulose was extracted from short bast fibers, from hemp (Cannabis sativa L.) plants harvested at seed maturity, non-retted, and mechanically decorticated in a defibering apparatus, giving non-aligned fibers. A chemical pretreatment with NaOH and HCl allowed the removal of most of the non-cellulosic components of the fibers. No bleaching was performed. The chemically pretreated fibers were then refined in a beater and treated with a cellulase enzyme, followed by mechanical defibrillation in an ultrafine friction grinder. The fibers were characterized by microscopy, infrared spectroscopy, thermogravimetric analysis and X-ray diffraction after each step of the process to understand the evolution of their morphology and composition. The obtained nanocellulose suspension was composed of short nanofibrils with widths of 5–12 nm, stacks of nanofibrils with widths of 20–200 nm, and some larger fibers. The crystallinity index was found to increase from 74% for the raw fibers to 80% for the nanocellulose. The nanocellulose retained a yellowish color, indicating the presence of some residual lignin. The properties of the nanopaper prepared with the hemp nanocellulose were similar to those of nanopapers prepared with wood pulp-derived rod-like nanofibrils.

In the EU, sheep bred for dairy and meat purposes are of low quality, their economic value is not even enough to cover shearing costs, and their wool is generally seen as a useless by-product of sheep farming, resulting in large illegal disposal or landfilling. In order to minimize environmental and health-related problems considering elemental compositions of discarded materials such as waste wool, there is a need to recycle and reuse waste materials to develop sustainable innovative technologies and transformation processes to achieve sustainable manufacturing. This study aims to examine the application of waste wool in biocomposite production with the help of a sustainable hydrolysis process without any chemicals and binding material. The impact of superheated water hydrolysis and mixing hydrolyzed wool fibers with kraft pulp on the performance of biocomposite was investigated and characterized using SEM, FTIR, tensile strength, DSC, TGA, and soil burial testing in comparison with 100% kraft pulp biocomposite. The superheated water hydrolysis process increases the hydrophilicity and homogeneity and contributes to increasing the speed of biodegradation. The biocomposite is entirely self-supporting, provides primary nutrients for soil nourishment, and is observed to be completely biodegradable when buried in the soil within 90 days. Among temperatures tested for superheated water hydrolysis of raw wool, 150 °C seems to be the most appropriate for the biocomposite preparation regarding physicochemical properties of wool and suitability for wool mixing with cellulose. The combination of a sustainable hydrolysis process and the use of waste wool in manufacturing an eco-friendly, biodegradable paper/biocomposite will open new potential opportunities for the utilization of waste wool in agricultural and packaging applications and minimize environmental impact.

The identification and quantitative determination of wool and fine animal fibers are of great interest in the textile field because of the significant price differences between them and common impurities in raw and processed textiles. Since animal fibers have remarkable similarities in their chemical and physical characteristics, specific identification methods have been studied and proposed following advances in analytical technologies. The identification methods of wool and fine animal fibers are reviewed in this paper, and the results of relevant studies are listed and summarized, starting from classical microscopy methods, which are still used today not only in small to medium enterprises but also in large industries, research studies and quality control laboratories. Particular attention has been paid to image analysis, Nir spectroscopy and proteomics, which constitute the most promising technologies of quality control in the manufacturing and trading of luxury textiles and can find application in forensic science and archeology.

Thanks to their unique physicochemical properties, ionic liquids (ILs) have moved from niche academic interest to critical components in various industrial applications. The textile industry, facing significant environmental and economic pressures, has begun to explore ILs as sustainable alternatives to traditional solvents and chemicals. This review summarizes research on the use of ILs in various textile processes, including dyeing, finishing, and fiber recycling, where their high thermal stability, tunable solubility, and low volatility are exploited to reduce resource consumption and environmental impact. The discussion also extends to the integration of ILs in textile waste recycling, highlighting innovative approaches to fiber dissolution and regeneration aimed at circular economy goals. Despite these advances, challenges such as high production costs and scalability remain barriers to the widespread adoption of ILs in the textile sector. Addressing these barriers through continued research and development is essential to fully realize the potential of ILs for sustainable transformation in textiles.