Study of Eco-Friendly Unhairing of Skins Using Only Plant-Based Residues

The replacement of sodium sulfide/hydrogen sulfide as unhairing agents in the tanning process is one of the objectives of many recent researches due to its obvious environmental benefits and the potential for improving working conditions. On the other hand, the use of agri-food wastes is one of the main objectives of the circular economy. The objective of this research was to demonstrate that an unhairing agent could be obtained from two highly abundant agri-food wastes (wheat bran and oat bran). For this purpose, their maceration processes were optimized to obtain two aqueous extracts with unhairing properties. From these, bacterial strains, that were able to produce an enzyme or set of enzymes with the best unhairing properties, were obtained. It was concluded that from the two agri-food wastes tested it is possible to obtain effective unhairing agents. The results pave the way for further research to develop a new enzymatic agent that will allow the industrial unhairing of hides without the need to use sodium sulfide/hydrogen sulfide.