Scientists Make Super-Strong Metallic Spider Silk
Date: 24-Apr-09
Country: UK
Author: Ben Hirschler
Scientists Make Super-Strong Metallic Spider Silk Photo: Seung-Mo Lee/MPI
Halle/Handout
An Araneus Spider in an undated image courtesy of researcher
Seung-Mo Lee of the Max Planck Institute of Microstructure Physics in Halle,
Germany.
Photo: Seung-Mo Lee/MPI Halle/Handout
LONDON - Spider silk is already tougher and lighter than steel, and now
scientists have made it three times stronger by adding small amounts of
metal.
The technique may be useful for manufacturing super-tough textiles and
high-tech medical materials, including artificial bones and tendons.
"It could make very strong thread for surgical operations," researcher Seung-Mo
Lee of the Max Planck Institute of Microstructure Physics in Halle, Germany,
said in a telephone interview.
Lee and colleagues, who published their findings in the journal Science,
found that adding zinc, titanium or aluminum to a length of spider silk made
it more resistant to breaking or deforming.
They used a process called atomic layer deposition, which not only coated
spider dragline silks with metal but also caused some metal ions to
penetrate the fibers and react with their protein structure.
Lee said he next wanted to try adding other materials, including artificial
polymers like Teflon.
The idea was inspired by studies showing traces of metals in the toughest
parts of some insect body parts. The jaws of leaf-cutter ants and locusts,
for example, both contain high levels of zinc, making them particularly
stiff and hard.
Spider silk has long fascinated scientists but producing it in commercial
quantities is difficult because spiders kept in captivity tend to eat each
other.
As a result, researchers have looked at alternative ways of producing silk
without spiders, by duplicating their spinning technique.
Approaches being tried include deriving fiber from the milk of transgenic
goats with an extra spider-silk gene and adapting silk produced by other
insects, such as silkworms.
(Editing by Tim Pearce)
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