Human Material Loop
We look where others don't
Some innovations that changed how we live began by seeing potential where others saw very little.
Human Material Loop exists to do the same for materials. We bring science, engineering and design together to transform overlooked biological resources into industrial materials.
Our work begins with keratin: a structural protein with exceptional material properties. It exists around us in enormous quantities, yet remains largely outside modern material manufacturing.
The next generation of materials will not only come from discovering new resources. It will come from understanding existing ones better.
Technology
The resource was never the problem. The technology was
Keratin gives hair, wool and feathers strength and resilience, yet its industrial potential remains largely untapped.
The challenge is not availability. It is engineering.
Through material science, chemistry and process engineering, we build the knowledge required to turn keratin-rich resources into consistent industrial materials.
Our ambition is to establish industrial keratin as a new material category.
“What industry sees as waste, we see as a concentrated source of keratin.”
First application
Textiles are where we start
ādara® is the first commercial application of our keratin technology.
We began with textiles because fibers offer a demanding test for a new material technology.
They must perform through processing, colouration, manufacturing and use, while integrating into an industry built around highly established materials and machinery.
But ādara® is a starting point. Our longer-term horizon is an industrial keratin platform enabling new materials, processes and applications across industries.
Platform
One resource. A family of materials.
Keratin does not have to remain in its original form. Through processing, separation and material engineering, keratin-rich resources can create different material building blocks.
Fibers
Proteins
Peptides
Amino acids
Films
Coatings
Functional ingredients
Resource
A resource hiding in plain sight
Human hair is continuously generated by salons, donations and wig manufacturing.
Yet once separated from the body, most of it has little industrial value and is discarded.
Hair requires no additional farmland, irrigation or cultivation to exist. The resource is already here. The challenge is creating the technology and infrastructure that allow it to become part of an industrial material system. We are building that system, connecting collection and processing with material production and manufacturing.
Hair is where we begin. It gives us an abundant keratin-rich resource to develop, test and scale our technology.
Ambition
From one fiber to a material platform
We started with a question: what if something routinely discarded could become an industrial resource?
Answering it required us to go beyond recycling. It required new knowledge about how keratin can be processed, engineered and integrated into manufacturing.
That knowledge is becoming a platform. Today, its first product is ādara®, our keratin-based textile fiber.
Tomorrow, the same scientific foundation can open possibilities for different material formats, processes and industries.
Our ambition is not simply to replace one fiber with another. It is to establish industrial keratin as a material category.
We start with textiles. We are building for what comes next.
Collaboration
Help build what comes next
The potential of industrial keratin extends beyond what we can develop alone.
We welcome research institutions, industry associations, manufacturers and companies to work with us on research, knowledge exchange and new applications.
From fundamental material research to industrial processes, we are interested in questions that expand how keratin is understood, engineered and used.
If you are working on a research programme, industry challenge or technology where our knowledge could contribute, we welcome proposals.