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Scientists Crack Silk's Secret
AEton writes "Researchers at Tufts University have reportedly discovered the mechanism by which spidersilk is produced. Besides the obvious use as a Kevlar substitute in bulletproof vests, silk has applications in microprocessor production, nanoscale optical fiber, a and any other application requiring strength and flexbility. Scientists have long grappled with the issue of creating silk; artificial silk is inferior to the real stuff, and the spiders can't be farmed (when you put them too close together, they eat each other). The method these Tufts researchers have found makes "strong silk" production feasible; if they can make it economical, the impact on safety equipment alone makes this material a worthwhile investment."
Scientists develop $5 artificial diamonds and scientists develop economically produced artificial silk; I'd say its been a pretty good time for those who had kept their hopes up for alchemy after the 18th century turned out unfruitful... How long until workers in industries "ruined" by scientific development (though only ever valued for the rareness of their product) develop a cult-like anti-scientific religion and take over the world?
Well, I've read the article. I've read Scientific American's version. I've read a few other ones google referenced. And I still haven't a fucking clue why silk is so strong.
Am I getting dumber, or are these science article getting more opaque?
"becuase of proteins with various properties" me arse.
This brings up an interesting question. Does anyone know what the difference is in properties between the silkworm's silk and the spider's silk?
"The only normal people are the ones you don't know very well."
You don't suppose this stuff could be strong enough to make a space elevator, could it?
pi = 3.141592653589793helpimtrappedinauniversefactory7
AFAIK, there have been several attempts to farm spiders, actually. Sure, spiders are creepy and potentially dangerous, but that's not why the attempts failed. (Having once been caught in the middle of an honest-to-God cattle stampede, I can tell you that a bunch of cows are scarier than a bunch of spiders any day of the week -- which, obviously, doesn't keep us from raising the critters.) The problem is that spiders are just stubborn; they spin webs pretty much only when they feel like it. Silkworms, OTOH, will turn out silk all day if you keep them fed.
Again, this is all AFAIK, based on stuff I heard a long time ago.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
"the spiders can't be farmed (when you put them too close together, they eat each other)."
:)
hey, not so fast.
check out this cbc article and click through to the photo gallery to get really creeped out.
that's one whole lotta silk. i'd still like to know who/what they ate to do that. and i'd really, really like to know what biochem outfit owns land nearby.
I understand from the article that they've figured out how strong silk is actually produced, which should give them a heads-up on making a mechanical/chemical process to do all this artificially. It should be pointed out, though, that there are already means for production of non-artificial spider silk currently, which the article seems to have missed.
~ Leilah
They aren't really "domesticated", just captured in the wild and kept in a container, such as a terrarium. A couple of crickets a week keeps them fed. There is one spider farm locally, collecting venom for research and anti-venin production. They use plastic refrigerator containers, and have well-sealed buildings. They have a small group of collectors - instead of raising the spiders, they buy mature females as needed.
I have an old microscope repair manual that explained how one gets the silk from the spider ... if I recall you put the spider in a rather large container, with a tiny shelter at the top. They will run a long strand from the shelter down to the bottom of the container and make their messy trap web there, of sticky strands. You harvest the long strand on a loop of wire and then lay the strand onto the glass reticule, usin gan alignment jig. It's sticky enough to cling to the glass.
I have to agree.
There is already a material being produced which is superior to spiders' silk in every way -- stronger, lighter, higher elongation-to-break, and easier to mass produce. It is called ultra-high molecular weight high-density polyethylene. Spectra is one form of the stuff; Dyneema is a superior form.
UM-HDPE is basically the same stuff that garbage bags are made of ("ordinary" HDPE), but the polyethylene chains in it are several tens of thousands of times longer. This was made possible by the discovery of a new process by which to build the PE chains, using a new catalyst (and lots and lots of MAO, which always cracks me up).
UM-HDPE production has been ramping up slowly over the past several years. In time, we should expect it to be fairly commonplace and inexpensive (Dyneema is currently extremely pricey stuff, due to limited production). So cracking the silk "code" is nothing to get riled up about, at least not from a material engineer's perspective. It's a johnny-come-latey. I seriously doubt its production could be ramped up any faster than Dyneema's, and Dyneema has a huge head start.
-- TTK