Papers

61,005 results
|
Article Tier 2

Microbiology Meets the Fashion World: A Paradigm Shift in Design Education and Practice Through Biotechnology

This study examines how integrating microbiology and biotechnology into fashion design education can shift the industry away from its fossil-fuel-dependent, fast-fashion model, arguing that transdisciplinary approaches using living organisms and bio-based materials represent a promising path toward sustainability in one of the world's most polluting industries.

2022 Preprints.org 3 citations
Article Tier 2

From Simplistic to Systemic Sustainability in the Textile and Fashion Industry

This paper is not about microplastic pollution. It examines sustainability challenges in the textile and fashion industry, arguing that current approaches are simplistic and insufficient. It proposes systemic solutions focused on circular value retention and sufficiency-based consumption to address waste, resource depletion, and pollution from fast fashion.

2023 Circular Economy and Sustainability 15 citations
Article Tier 2

Applications in Sustainable Fashion

Researchers reviewed the application of hydrogel and aerogel technologies in sustainable fashion, examining how these materials can address environmental concerns including microplastic pollution, excessive water use, and non-biodegradable waste while enabling closed-loop production models and advanced functions such as energy-harvesting footwear.

2026
Article Tier 2

New perspectives in fashion sustainability through the use of bacterial cellulose

This review examines how bacterial cellulose can open new sustainability pathways for the fashion industry, exploring its potential as a bio-based material to reduce the sector's high environmental impact from accelerating production cycles and increasing textile waste.

2022 Proceedings of DRS 10 citations
Article Tier 2

Microbial nanocellulose biotextiles for a circular materials economy

Researchers developed sustainable biotextiles from microbial nanocellulose combined with ancient textile techniques, creating rapidly renewable, low-toxicity, and biodegradable materials as circular economy alternatives to synthetic plastic-based fabrics.

2022 Environmental Science Advances 26 citations
Article Tier 2

Recrafting textile futures: Caring and repairing as a way to design

This study examines the textile and clothing supply chain as an extractive linear system embedded in a growth-oriented economic model, and explores how caring and repairing practices can support a transition toward reparative, circular textile futures. The paper argues that eco-modern innovation alone is insufficient and that sustainable textile design requires repositioning toward longer time horizons and degrowth-aligned approaches.

2023 4 citations
Article Tier 2

Rebirth: An Exploration of Circular Fashion

This review examines the concept of circular fashion as a response to fast fashion's unsustainable practices, critically evaluating how greenwashing has emerged as a mechanism to monetize eco-initiatives without genuine environmental benefit. The paper analyzes case studies of circular fashion brands and proposes criteria for distinguishing authentic circular economy practices from superficial marketing claims.

2024 The Boller Review 1 citations
Review Tier 2

Mapping sustainable options in the fashion industry: A systematic literature review and a future research agenda

This systematic review examined 187 studies on sustainable practices in the fashion industry, which is a major contributor to microplastic pollution through synthetic textiles. Researchers classified sustainable solutions across the purchase, use, and disposal phases of clothing and identified key gaps in current knowledge. The study suggests that addressing fashion industry practices is critical for reducing textile-related microplastic contamination in the environment.

2024 Sustainable Development 27 citations
Article Tier 2

Sustainable Fashion

This review of sustainable fashion examines how the textile industry's shift to fast fashion has accelerated environmental damage, including the shedding of synthetic microfibres — a major source of microplastic pollution in waterways — and argues that circular production models and consumer behaviour change are needed to reduce the industry's footprint. The paper is relevant because textile microfibres are among the most commonly detected microplastics in marine and freshwater environments.

2026 International Journal for Research in Applied Science and Engineering Technology
Article Tier 2

Can fashion be sustainable? Trajectories of change in organizational, products and processes, and socio-cultural contexts

This article provides a comprehensive framework for understanding sustainability in the fashion industry across three key dimensions: organizational change, innovation in products and processes, and socio-cultural transformation. Researchers analyzed how shifts in management practices, materials science, and consumer behavior collectively shape the industry's sustainability efforts. The study highlights that meaningful progress requires coordinated action across all three dimensions rather than isolated initiatives.

2024 Sustainability Science Practice and Policy 17 citations
Article Tier 2

Biomaterial Experimental Design Practices as an Strategy for Sustainable Fashion

This paper explores biomaterial design — including alternatives to synthetic polyester fibers — to drive sustainability innovation in the fashion industry. Reducing reliance on synthetic textiles like polyester could help decrease microplastic fiber pollution released during washing.

2022 MIX Sustentável 5 citations
Article Tier 2

Fashion, Sustainability, and the Anthropocene

This review examines the environmental impact of clothing consumption in the context of the Anthropocene, discussing emerging sustainable materials and circular economic models against the broader historical backdrop of human-environment interactions in the fashion industry.

2017 Utopian Studies 44 citations
Article Tier 2

Liquid-State Surface Fermentation of Mycelium Mats to Produce Sustainable Leather-Like Materials

Researchers developed a liquid-state surface fermentation method using mycelium mats to produce sustainable leather-like materials as a bio-based alternative to fossil-derived textiles, addressing the fashion industry's significant contributions to greenhouse gas emissions and wastewater pollution.

2025 CONECT International Scientific Conference of Environmental and Climate Technologies
Article Tier 2

The current situation of fast fashion industry and how to reduce the waste

This paper reviews the environmental problems caused by the fast fashion industry and evaluates current and emerging solutions including circular economy design and advanced recycling technologies. The authors argue that traditional waste disposal is no longer adequate for the volume of textile waste generated. Transitioning to circular fashion models could reduce the textile fiber microplastics that wash off synthetic clothing into waterways.

2023 Advances in Economics Management and Political Sciences 2 citations
Article Tier 2

Analyzing Sustainability in Fashion Through Bio-Synthetic Materials

This review analyzes sustainability in the fashion industry through the lens of bio-synthetic materials, examining how synthetic biology and bioengineering can transform microbes into 'living factories' that produce sustainable textiles as alternatives to conventional synthetic fibers that contribute to microplastic pollution.

2025 Fashion Highlight
Review Tier 2

Regenerative Product Design: a Literature Review in an Emerging Field

This literature review examines the emerging field of regenerative product design, exploring how materials and systems can be designed to repair, recreate, or revitalize their own resources at local, regional, and global scales. The authors analyze how regenerative principles differ from sustainability and circular economy frameworks and what they mean for material selection, user behavior, and product interaction.

2024
Systematic Review Tier 1

Life cycle assessment in fashion industry: a systematic review

This systematic review of life cycle assessments in the fashion industry (2010-2024) found persistent methodological inconsistencies that undermine the reliability of sustainability claims. The review identifies microplastic emissions from textiles as a growing but poorly incorporated impact category, highlighting a gap in understanding the full environmental footprint of clothing.

2025 Discover Sustainability
Article Tier 2

Sustainable collection development towards greener future: Earthsavers

Researchers examined the 'Earthsavers' sustainable textile collection as a case study in environmentally aware fashion design, analyzing how the collection addresses environmental harms from the textile sector including waste disposal, resource depletion, and the role of synthetic plastic-based fabrics.

2022 Communications in development and assembling of textile products 1 citations
Article Tier 2

The Potential for Regenerated Protein Fibres within a Circular Economy: Lessons from the Past Can Inform Sustainable Innovation in the Textiles Industry

This review explores the history and future potential of regenerated protein fibers as a sustainable alternative in the textiles industry. Researchers examine how fibers derived from plant and animal protein waste could reduce dependence on synthetic plastics and ease pressure on natural fiber production. The study argues that revisiting mid-twentieth-century fiber technologies with modern processing methods could help address the textile industry's environmental footprint, including its contribution to microplastic pollution.

2021 Sustainability 55 citations
Article Tier 2

Sustainable Textile Innovation: Biodegradable Fabrics and Their Role in Climate Action

This review examines the textile industry's environmental footprint—including microplastic shedding from synthetic fibers—and makes the case for biodegradable fabric alternatives as part of a broader shift toward circular economy and climate-aligned fashion production.

2025 Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)
Article Tier 2

Sustainability trends and gaps in the textile, apparel and fashion industries

Researchers conducted a 20-year systematic review of sustainability in the fashion and textile industry, identifying consumer behavior, circular economy practices, and supply chain transparency as the three main research themes. The review highlights that synthetic textile fibers — a major source of microplastic pollution — are embedded in a complex industry that still lacks coherent sustainability standards across its global supply chains.

2023 Environment Development and Sustainability 223 citations
Article Tier 2

Methods for Natural and Synthetic Polymers Recovery from Textile Waste

This review examined methods for recovering natural and synthetic polymers from textile waste, highlighting how the fashion industry generates massive microplastic pollution and greenhouse gas emissions annually. The authors compared recycling approaches for both natural fibers (cellulose, protein) and synthetic polymers, assessing their environmental trade-offs.

2022 Polymers 44 citations
Article Tier 2

Linear Economy versus Circular Economy: New raw material

This paper examines the fashion industry's role in environmental sustainability and argues for a transition from linear to circular economic models. It highlights how the current take-make-waste approach generates massive textile waste, including synthetic microplastic fibers. A circular fashion economy would reduce both material waste and plastic pollution from textiles.

2022 Turk Turizm Arastirmalari Dergisi 4 citations
Article Tier 2

How can we deal with the large amount of microplastics delivered to landfills and released into the environment by fast fashion? A practical valorization approach for mitigating textile fibrous microplastics before affecting the environment.

Researchers proposed a practical valorization approach for managing fibrous microplastics generated by fast fashion textile waste, addressing the challenge of large volumes of textile microplastics entering landfills and the environment through a circular economy framework to intercept fibers before environmental release.

2022 Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)