Shellac is a resin secreted by the female lac bug on trees in the forests of India and Thailand. Chemically, it is mainly composed of aleuritic acid, jalaric acid, shellolic acid, and other natural waxes. It is processed and sold as dry flakes and dissolved in alcohol to make liquid shellac, which is used as a brush-on colorant, food glaze and wood finish. Shellac functions as a tough natural primer, sanding sealant, tannin-blocker, odour-blocker, stain, and high-gloss varnish. Shellac was once used in electrical applications as it possesses good insulation qualities and seals out moisture. Phonograph and 78 rpm gramophone records were made of shellac until they were gradually replaced by vinyl. By 1948 shellac was no longer used to make records.
Waxes are a diverse class of organic compounds that are lipophilic, malleable solids near ambient temperatures. They include higher alkanes and lipids, typically with melting points above about 40 °C (104 °F), melting to give low viscosity liquids. Waxes are insoluble in water but soluble in nonpolar organic solvents such as hexane, benzene and chloroform. Natural waxes of different types are produced by plants and animals and occur in petroleum.
In polymer chemistry and materials science, a resin is a solid or highly viscous substance of plant or synthetic origin that is typically convertible into polymers. Resins are usually mixtures of organic compounds. This article focuses mainly on naturally occurring resins.
Varnish is a clear transparent hard protective coating or film. It is not to be confused with wood stain. It usually has a yellowish shade due to the manufacturing process and materials used, but it may also be pigmented as desired. It is sold commercially in various shades.
Lacquer is a type of hard and usually shiny coating or finish applied to materials such as wood or metal. It is most often made from resin extracted from trees and waxes and has been in use since antiquity.
A lake pigment is a pigment made by precipitating a dye with an inert binder, or mordant, usually a metallic salt. Unlike vermilion, ultramarine, and other pigments made from ground minerals, lake pigments are chemically organic. Manufacturers and suppliers to artists and industry frequently omit the lake designation in the name. Many lake pigments are fugitive because the dyes involved are not lightfast. Red lakes were particularly important in Renaissance and Baroque paintings; they were often used as translucent glazes to portray the colors of rich fabrics and draperies.
Balsam is the resinous exudate which forms on certain kinds of trees and shrubs. Balsam owes its name to the biblical Balm of Gilead.
Scale insects are small insects of the order Hemiptera, suborder Sternorrhyncha. Of dramatically variable appearance and extreme sexual dimorphism, they comprise the infraorder Coccomorpha which is considered a more convenient grouping than the superfamily Coccoidea due to taxonomic uncertainties. Adult females typically have soft bodies and no limbs, and are concealed underneath domed scales, extruding quantities of wax for protection. Some species are hermaphroditic, with a combined ovotestis instead of separate ovaries and testes. Males, in the species where they occur, have legs and sometimes wings, and resemble small flies. Scale insects are herbivores, piercing plant tissues with their mouthparts and remaining in one place, feeding on sap. The excess fluid they imbibe is secreted as honeydew on which sooty mold tends to grow. The insects often have a mutualistic relationship with ants, which feed on the honeydew and protect them from predators. There are about 8,000 described species.
Lacquerware are objects decoratively covered with lacquer. Lacquerware includes small or large containers, tableware, a variety of small objects carried by people, and larger objects such as furniture and even coffins painted with lacquer. Before lacquering, the surface is sometimes painted with pictures, inlaid with shell and other materials, or carved. The lacquer can be dusted with gold or silver and given further decorative treatments.
Resinous glaze is an alcohol-based solution of various types of food-grade shellac. The shellac is derived from the raw material sticklac, which is a resin scraped from the branches of trees left from when the small insect, Kerria lacca, creates a hard, waterproof cocoon. When used in food and confections, it is also known as confectioner's glaze, pure food glaze, natural glaze, or confectioner's resin. When used on medicines, it is sometimes called pharmaceutical glaze.
Butea is a genus of flowering plants belonging to the pea family, Fabaceae. It includes five species native to the Indian Subcontinent, Indochina, Tibet, and southern China. It is sometimes considered to have only two species, B. monosperma and B. superba, or is expanded to include four or five.
Butea monosperma is a species of Butea native to tropical and sub-tropical parts of South Asia and Southeast Asia. It is also known as flame of the forest, Bengal kino, dhak, palash, and bastard teak. Revered as sacred by Hindus, it is prized for producing an abundance of vivid blooms, and it is also cultivated elsewhere as an ornamental.
Samanea saman is a species of flowering tree in the pea family, Fabaceae, now in the Mimosoid clade and is native to Central and South America. It is often placed in the genus Samanea, which by yet other authors is subsumed in Albizia entirely.
Kerria lacca is a species of insect in the family Kerriidae, the lac insects. These are in the superfamily Coccoidea, the scale insects. This species is perhaps the most commercially important lac insect, being a main source of lac, a resin which can be refined into shellac and other products. This insect is native to Asia.
Kerriidae is a family of scale insects, commonly known as lac insects or lac scales. Some members of the genera Metatachardia, Tachardiella, Austrotacharidia, Afrotachardina, Tachardina, and Kerria are raised for commercial purposes, though the most commonly cultivated species is Kerria lacca. These insects secrete a waxy resin that is harvested and converted commercially into lac and shellac, used in various dyes, cosmetics, food glazes, wood finishing varnishes and polishes.
Schleichera is a monotypic genus of plants in the soapberry family, Sapindaceae. There is only one species, Schleichera oleosa, a tree that occurs in the Indian Subcontinent and Southeast Asia.
The Indian Institute of Natural Resins and Gums, formerly known as the Indian Lac Research Institute, is an autonomous institute, established under the umbrella of Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) by the Ministry of Agriculture, Government of India for advanced research on lac and other natural resins and gums. The Institute is located at Namkum, Ranchi in Jharkhand, India.
Red pigments are materials, usually made from minerals, used to create the red colors in painting and other arts. The color of red and other pigments is determined by the way it absorbs certain parts of the spectrum of visible light and reflects the others. The brilliant opaque red of vermillion, for example, results because vermillion reflects the major part of red light, but absorbs the blue, green and yellow parts of white light.
Laccaic acids or laccainic acids are a group of five anthraquinone derivatives, designated A through E, which are components of the red shellac obtained from the insect Kerria lacca, similar to carminic acid and kermesic acid. This article focuses primarily on laccaic acid A (LCA).
