Insect Substance Synthesized For Science

An anonymous reader wrote to mention an article discussing the successful synthesis of resilin, a super-elastic material used by insects to perform amazing feats. From the article: "Dr. Elvin predicted the substance would lead to everything from artificial arteries to spinal parts that would not wear out despite being flexed 100 million times. 'That's how many times you move your back in 50 or 60 years,' he said. It could also be used in micro electronics. 'We even imagine putting it in running shoes.'"

Comments

Price

[GenKreton]

This all sounds very good but how cost efficient will large, industry scale production of resin be? Just because they can successfully reproduce its chemical structure does not mean that they can do it in a cost efficient enough manner to break into any of the mentioned markets.

Re:Price

[stunt_penguin]

"The scientists initially cloned the fruit fly gene that naturally produces the material. It was then put into bacteria, creating a biological "factory" to reproduce it as a liquid. The liquid was then cured under projector bulbs to form a workable solid."
As far as i'm aware, insulin is made by a similar process using bacteria that have been genetically altered to produce the substance in large quntities. It isn't a particularly new technique past the point of getting the initial bacteria to produce the substance, so here's hoping (hopping!!) that we can make use of what sounds like a great material as cheap as possible.

Re:Price

[Itchy Rich]

This all sounds very good but how cost efficient will large, industry scale production of resin be?

Pretty efficient I expect. Having substances made by bacteria isn't a new idea, and since this will primarily be proccesed in liquid form is should be fairly easy to produce. The major question for me would be how long the bacteria take to synthesise the material.

The question as to whether it's economically viable is misleading, because you can't answer it accurately without knowing the application for which you're determining viability. I would guess that there will be so many possible applications for this that it wont be hard to find some that can afford the probably high initial cost.

Re:Go Australian Scientists ....

[my ky is brokn]

Now lets see another invention go overseas while our anti science government sits on its's hands ...

Anothr invntion go ovrsas? Invntions don't gt outsourcd...thy gt invntd. Nxt tim, try a littl hardr with the anti-govrnmnt rhtoric.

Yeah it's flexible

[3.5 stripes]

But will your body accept it?

It doesn't do any good if your body rejects your new arteries..

Why do insects produce such amazing substances?

[Vellmont]

Spiders produce super-strong silk, other insects produce this perfect rubber substance. What is it about insects that they produce such desireable materials? Are there more insect substances equally amazing?

Re:Why do insects produce such amazing substances?

[SB5]

You have heard of evolution right? You don't live in Kansas do you?

Natural selection gets rid of competitors that can't compete. The best way to compete is to have the best of the best, because then you don't have to compete to survive as much.

Lets have two people swim in a race, one guy will wear a wetsuit and flippers and one will wear a regular speedo bathing suit. The guy in the suit probably has a better chance of winning because of the wetsuit and flippers.

Now take two people with wetsuit and flippers. each person has different flippers and wetsuits....

Now repeat those trials 100 billion times. You will have found after repeated trials someone with probably the most efficient flippers and wetsuit combination.

Re:Why do insects produce such amazing substances?

[Anonymous Coward]

Now that's a perfect explanation for why we don't fart silk or rubber...yet.

Then again, keeping on that frame of mind, bacteria should be building spaceships now.

Note: 1) desirability of a organically produced material derives strictly from our criteria

            2) steel-like silk and such are really far from being the only desireable substances produced by living organisms that we have exploited. Plants and fungi are probably the most popular sources of interesting compounds (think wood and peniciline)

Super...

[Anonymous Coward]

Love to get some of that stuff into my knee joints. It'll be great to not have to worry about wearing them out. Too bad he said it'll take at least a decade to make human joint replacements. Hope other researchers jump in to speed it up.

Until someone pulls the drain plug

[brokeninside]

After the water all runs out, those without flippers, or with minimal flippers suddenly start to outcompete those with the uberflippers.

Not to mention, your view of competition is a bit skewed. Natural selection favors survival of the adequate, not survival of the fittest. Only in extreme situations does being the best help individuals survive to a significantly greater extent than being adequate. Certainly, there are some situations in nature where resources are so scarce that only the `best' survive, but throughout most of the natural world, being adequate is good enough.

And not to mention that adequateness in natural selection is defined entirely by propagating one's genes. It doesn't matter if a swimmer has the best fins in the world if the guys in speedos mate more frequently and have enough progeny to ensure that some survive the attacks of their quicker swimming brethren.

Re:The new WMD?

[zev1983]

Using resilin balls as ammunition it would be like that scene in Men in Black where the bouncy ball tore up half the office. I can think of a few places I could use that....