Natures wonders: spider web tensile strength (Introduction)

by David Turell @, Thursday, January 09, 2014, 02:17 (3722 days ago) @ David Turell

Weight for weight stronger than steel!:-"Spider silk, then, is stronger than steel on a per weight basis while being very environmentally friendly. This may not have the same pithy ring to it as "spider silk is stronger than steel", but it tells a much more dramatic story about why the mimicry of natural materials is a rapidly growing area of materials science and engineering.-"We are yet to be able to fully understand how spider silk is made. An attempt at commercialisation through "spider goats", where a genetically modified goat produced milk containing an extra protein that could be extracted and spun into spider silk thread, resulted in bankruptcy. But hope remains that by studying how spider silk delivers its strength through a sequences of genes present in spider DNA, engineers will one day be able to build airplanes and other high-performance devices using planet-sparing materials rich in information and low in energy."--http://theconversation.com/spider-silk-is-a-wonder-of-nature-but-its-not-stronger-than-steel-14879


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