Slashdot Mirror
MIT Labs Moves Ahead In Synthesizing Spider Silk
icepick72 writes in with a link to an ExtremeTech article on new methods for creating synthetic spider silk. This material, like lycra in many ways, has a number of unique properties. The MIT lab that created it is being monitored by military elements, keenly interested in applications of this material to front-line technologies. From the article: "The secret of spider silk's combined strength and flexibility, according to scientists, has to do with the arrangement of the nano-crystalline reinforcement of the silk as it is being produced--in other words, the way these tiny crystals are oriented towards (and adhere to) the stretchy protein. Emulating this process in a synthetic polymer, the MIT team focused on reinforcing solutions of commercial rubbery substance known as polyurethane elastomer with nano-sized clay platelets instead of simply heating and mixing the molten plastics with reinforcing agents."
If the author of TFA needs to dumb it down for him/herself, fine. But I wish they wouldn't assume that we all have a G.W.Bush I.Q.
Other than this text, there is no discernible information contained in this sig.
They are reinventing the prior art of his.
With great power comes great responsibility. Remember that, MIT. Remember that.
Reproducing the elasticity and strength attributes would be great. It would be even cooler if the synthetic materials developed were also biodegradable.
"it is being monitored by military elements, keenly interested in applications of this material to front-line technologies"
I smell another 'non-lethal' crowd control option brewing.
"Keep them people down with webs, Private!"
It's funnier than spiders shitting it out, it's all about the goats shooting it out of their tits.
And in memory of the first AC to make me spew coffee not just all over the keyboard and the monitor, but into the adjacent cube, the following comment didn't quite make it into the archives some six years ago:
If it's any consolation, the goats probably do shoot it outa their tits by now.
Give us a break, spiders have about a 400 million year head start on us.
Ok, I get that...
"...has a number of unique properties."
Wait. So, is it like lycra, or mostly unique?
To prevent this day from getting worse, I'll just read ERROR as GOOD TH
If I hear anything about flying mini-gliders, I'm going to seriously freak...
"large metal spider butts"
I hear one group tried this, but a soon as one of them mentioned the word "large", the female spider attached to the butt ate the whole group.
Seriously, I worked in a nylon spinning plant a long time ago and a large knitting machine looks a bit like a spiders butt Howvever, it takes a five story tall "machine" engineered with incredible presicion to make the fine threads that go into a stocking, the static on some parts of the machine can throw a spark over a foot long.
I don't know exactly how a spider's butt works (or for that matter a nylon plant), but I assume the spiders superiour abilities are related to the intricate and amazingly complex nano machinery inside every cell of the spider.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
I was watching a show about 10 years into early research into this.
The biggest interest was extremley light weight bullet proof clothing.
The military would be very interested if they can get their infantry to loose several kilo's of body armour.
Between this and the http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/02/0 8/2215253&tid=99GM goats we should have Alec Guinness' white suit in no time.
I don't think we should bother upgrading our troops until we've at least researched Photon Wall.
I love the fact that no one understands the summary so everyone just tags the article as 'science'.
So have winged reptiles (birds), and look where we are now after what the Wright Brothers achieved with first flight, in little over a century. What is your point?
Jonathanjk.com
Until quite recently, spider silk had been the highest tensile strength of any substance known to man, and the name Silksteel pays homage to the arachnid for good reason.
I believe that the term is "he fell ass-backwards into the Presidency".
Name.
All it takes to sway a moron without an opinion is the name.
Bot Assisted Blogging
So in your world there is a correlation between political achievement and intelligence?
My god, which world is this you are from? If this is true it must be a paradise on Earth! If we could but all live there.
This would make a marvelous material for suspension bridges. It could drastically reduce the weight, which means that the foundations don't need to be as massive (read: expensive).
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
This work at MIT is not really an attempt to make synthetic spider silk but just something with similar properties.
Spider silk is a kind made of protein and the feedstock is a liquid crystal
A company called Spinox Ltd (an Oxford University Spin off -- get it? ha ha ). Here is a note from a Smith Insitute workshop on the topic.
This group is actually trying to emulate what goes on in a spider (biomimetics). The big advantage is that it uses harmless ingredients and low temperatures. Compare for example Kevlar, the manufacture of which needs concentrated sulfuric acid. Spinox details
That's a rather unfair generalization. I'd say we average about .6wit. There are maybe 10% with their wits about them, 10% totally witless, about 55% are half-wits, and 25% are .8wits. Unfortunately the witless and the halfwits come out in droves, and most vote strait-ticket for whomever opposes gay people and reason.
With this :
1 1/0430240
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/12/
We may have sussed it.
Because you can - or because you should?
What a stupid generalisation. What about all the quarter-wits?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Wow, looks like the U.S. Military will be faced with two options for next generation armour -- this and Troy Hurtubise's Anti-Grizzly Suit. I wonder who would win in a fight to the death?
games journalism blog
Long chain molecules contain lots of carbon-carbon bonds. The polythene thing you get at the top of a six-pack of beer has lots of these chain molecules, but it is fairly weak. Stretch a bit of it, and you will see a sudden jump between the fat, unstretched material, and the skinnier, stretched material. The stretched stuff is a lot less stretchy. What you have done when you stretched the thing was to align the molecules, so you have chains of carbon-carbon bonds in the direction you have stretched the thing. Mylar - the stuff you sometimes find inside bicycle wheels and protective cloting is strengthened in this way.
That is only part of the secret. A diamond is made of carbon-carbon bonds in every direction, but you can shatter a diamond, and when you do the energies absorbed by the diamond are pretty tiny. If you want to make something tough, you will need some strategy for the thing to yeild and absorb energy. Metals yeild when they are stressed beyond a certain point, but they can still keep their strength. Carbon fibre materials can crack, but the carbon fibres have two strategies for resisting the crack. The fibres can separate from the glue matrix. If a fibre lies across the gap, then a lot of work is necessary to pull the fibtre free of the matrix as the crack opens. If the fibre lies along the crack, it can stop the crack becayse the crack may run around the fibre surface, and so end up with a blunt tip (the sharper the crack tip is, the more it concentrates the stress). ness of the crack tip .
Another thing you will probably need in a sting is some ability to absorb energy without yeilding. Steel wire is a lot lighter for the same ability to support load, but climbers do not use it. The first thing a climber's rope needs to do is to absorb the energy from the falling climber. If it does not stretch, then the energy has to be absorbed over a small distance, so the force needed has to be that much bigger. Making where the threads so not go straight up and down have more 'give' in them.
Okay - I have cut a lot of corners in this explanation. There are scientific terms for strength, hardness, toughness, and things like that that are often confused in ordinary speech. However, I hope I have got across the basics - making long chain molecules isn't enough - you have to make them go up and down the thread; but not straight up and down or the thread will not stretch; and you have to glue them together with something sticky that absorbs energy as it yeilds. A spider's butt probably manages this because it is small, and the spinarets are a complex shape. All the bits seem do-able, but it's a good trick: people have been trying for many years, and we are not close yet. Maybe, there is another trick in there we haven't suspected yet.
PS: The process probably won't scale. So, you will have thousands of minature spider's butts, rather than one giant one.
Maybe they need Cyborg spiders ala The Web Between The Worlds :)
Was that supposed to be funny or do you have no actual understanding of what you're talking about?
Increase your odds for the suit -- its inventor upgraded it recently.
Seriously, DARPA has been working with MIT through the Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies to develop advanced armor, apparently including powered armor.
Revive the Constitution.
Nice explanation; I'd like to add that climbers don't use steel cables because, like you said, they absorb the energy of the fall over a short distance - very uncomfortable/dangerous to the climber when he or she falls.
With a rope you get a nice "stretch" and bounce rather than jerked to a stop and a possible case of whiplash.
For the same reason, safety lanyards used to tie off in construction have a "bunched" portion that expands under load.
The Wright Brothers were years behind the actual inventors to build the first sustained flight capable aeroplane, and this was done in Europe.
I'm not sure that's such an advantage. There's concentrated sulfuric acid in car batteries, people have been driving cars for a hundred years, how many people have suffered accidents from battery acid in that time? I mean, compared to overall accidents involving cars?
Industrial processes often involve nasty chemicals, at dangerous temperatures and pressures. That's no big deal, one can easily take all the necessary precautions. The problem is when the industrial process consumes a large amount of a limited resource, or when it generates a large amount of waste.
SIGSEGV caught, terminating
wait... not that kind of sig.
Commonly referred to as "static" line, and "shock" line.
Samsung took back my unlocked bootloader because Google wants me to rent movies. They're both evil.
Of course there is a correlation between political achievement and intelligence, even on this planet. I think if that if you calculate the coefficient, it will show a strong correlation, something around -0.92 or so.
The Wright brothers developed POWERED flight. That is a hugely different thing than a glider that can ride thermals.
Powered flight = birds
Non-powered flight = flying squirrel
Both are impressive achievements, but be real. The Wright brothers fathered modern air travel.
My god, which world is this you are from? If this is true it must be a paradise on Earth! If we could but all live there.
If we all lived there, it wouldn't be like that any more.
Actually it's the silk protein that is produced in the goat's milk. The process of creating the silk for the web deals with pushing it through (varying the amount of water mixed with it) the silk sac. The gene (and protein) sequence for the silk protein is known, but the actually process of making it into a web is still in the R&D department. Sorry if the parent already said this.. I'm too lazy to look. :P
also why seatbelts have a stiched "break away" section - the stitching gives, and slows you before you take the full florce of the belt. Also why you are supposed to replace the seatbelt after a crash (or at least inspect the stiching)
-- 73 de KG2V For the Children - RKBA! "You are what you do when it counts" - the Masso
my hunter just got a pattern for an armor that requires spider silk. I wonder if I could use the spider silk, and if so, how long it'll take for the synthetic stuff to make it to Warcraft?
When you sympathize with stupidity, you start thinking like an idiot.
I think you are splitting hairs there, its still flight and it is the only way mankind is going to match and exceed natural flight.
Jonathanjk.com
Thank you :) :)
You'r answer to my ill tempered trolling was most excellent
Bot Assisted Blogging
In addition to licensing the formula to chemical companies and manufacturers, the would make a hell of alot more by licensing to toy companie. THAT would be a huge sale during the next Spider Man release or Christmas season. The problems that happened during the Tickle Me Elmo ordeal would pale in comparison.
Knowing Google's lust for data collection, the Soviet Union is still alive and well inside the psyche of Sergey Brin....
A lot of spiders webs have blobs of goo every so often along any particular stretch of silk. The surface tension of the blob of goo pulls the nearest sections of silk inside the blob and so pulls the line taught. When the prey impacts the web, the silk inside the blob is stretched out and this absorbs the stress, so that the web doesn't break.
and we're trying to become more like spiders because.....? lol and what are they using it for anyway? is it a new technology for soldiers to live in web tents out in the desert or something? Here we go again, looking for new ways to impress ourselves with "technology". Silly people :)
Did it occur to noone that this research is actually part of a bigger picture? The plan is to make synthetic web so we can make spiders as lazy as we are!!! We'll provide the web, and give the spider some personal time to figure out what they want to do with their life.
Oh boy, I better get cracking on my Spiderman suit....
There was this thing some chap invented quite some time ago, I think his name must have been Bell, called the 'Bell Curve', representing the statistical patterns that appear in nearly any collection of data one cares to poke a stick at.
Being that 98% of the majority (51% as it is considered in politics generally) are halfwits, it is no wonder we are in the mess we are in. This segment of the population is the most pliable to political trickery and least likely to notice they are being lied to.
The Republic is a tyranny of the majority of idiots who have no business determining the process of social change, and the God-King Emperor/President is just the face selected from the two options which is the least ugly. Democracy is a way to make everyone think that they are participating when in actual fact the outcomes are determined by those with the most money to brainwash the most people, and up the chain to the ones lending out imaginary money who decide who gets to play with the next wave of funny money and thereby giving them control over politics by selecting which groups they are the most generous with.
I don't know if there is anything that can be done to change the shape of it. For example, if we selectively culled those below 100 IQ (assuming one can settle on a test which gives a useful answer) then the whole curve just shifts into the right hand side from before and assumes the same structure. Is intelligence at issue, or is it emotional lability? I have met plenty of clever people who are brainwashed or believe the most inordinate nonsense. Lao Tzu would say that increasing the cleverness of the people would just lead to more sophisticated forms of trickery and crime. Making people dumber will not help either.
I gave up some years ago when I realised that the only thing one can do is find a way to advance towards one's goals, and use other people to define the faults we wish to eradicate in ourselves.
Anyway, back to the topic - synthetic spider silk sure would improve safety for mountain climbers, especially if combined with that gecko sticky stuff one of the first comments referenced, and probably would be very useful for special ops sneaking into enemy installations and planting charges. The idea of a device one can fire a very long and thin but extremely strong rope that ends in a sticky surface that will literally stick to anything strongly enough to hold the weight of a fully laden soldier is a very interesting piece of technology.
Imagine the wonderful pranks such technology would enable. Now that is what I am most interested in.
Now you know how us liberals feel. You guys STILL haven't stopped with the damn Clinton jokes. Tell you what, you guys stop making dumb Clinton jokes, we'll stop making stupdid Bush jokes. Deal?
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
We'll know MIT has done it if Cal Tech is suddenly covered in cobwebs one night.
Wow. If you watch the version and with commentary and have enough experience with cellular biology to understand the terminology, you will see that the whole video is just limited parts of the process for a cell to signal that it needs a white blood cell to come and destroy an invader. Believing that we haven't yet been able to bring the large scale manufacture of spider silk in synthetic factory conditions isn't that much of a stretch.
I'll never make that mistake again, reading the experts' opinions. - Feynman
I prefer to know things like that in test weight...
20,000,000 pound Test...
That salmon ain't 'gettin away now!
How much is your data worth? Back it up now.
I have seen the commentary version and have a rough idea of what is happening but I prefer the music version, it's much kinder to my layman's brain. :)
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.