**4. Conclusions**

Here we have shown that HFIP–silk fibroin aerogel fibers can be utilized as a platform to anchor noble metal nanoparticles onto the surface of silk nanofibrils. The silk aerogels have a high surface area and are composed of different percentages of noble metals, which are based primarily on the nobility, not the concentration. This changes the mass percentage, porosity, surface area, and pore diameter. Compared with other biopolymers, which have acted as templates with noble metals, silk is much simpler to process and does not require any chemical crosslinking. Palladium, platinum, and gold nanoparticle growth have been shown on silk fibroin aerogel fibers. The molecular structure of silk is unchanged when anchored with different noble metals. These silk fibroin noble metal aerogels have potential utility in energy storage and conversion that can be used where degradable, flexible materials are required.
