Abstract
IN 1925, the Indian Government founded the Lac Research Institute to ensure that the rapid development of rival products, and the high price levels reached in the post-War period, did not cause lac to meet the same fate that indigo had suffered previously. The results obtained during the first nine years work of the Institute and the present trend of the investigations have recently been published as an illustrated booklet in concise, interesting and non-technical form (“Lac and the Indian Lac Research Institute”, by D. Norris, P. M. Glover and R. W. Aldis. Nan-kum: Lac Research Institute. Rs. 2.8). The lac insect yields both a colouring matter and a resin, and it was for the former product that it was originally cultivated. With the discovery of aniline dyes, however, the lac dye industry came to an end and the resin in unmanufactured form as lac, or the manufactured form as shellac, became the important feature of the industry. The uses to which shellac can be put are numerous, but the greatest proportion is adsorbed by the gramophone, electrical and varnish trades. The increasing use of synthetic resins such as bakelite inevitably threatened the industry, but as new methods have now been discovered whereby the natural product may be used in combination with the synthetic, the situation has improved. Research work is carried out on entomological, chemical and biochemical lines, many problems naturally occurring with regard to the insect and its host plant as well as the secretion of lac and its preparation for the market.
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Research on Shellac. Nature 136, 545 (1935). https://doi.org/10.1038/136545c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/136545c0