Spinning an Artificial Web

Spider’s web is made of a thread which is much stronger than any thread artificially produced in that size diameter. It’s tensile strength is 1.3 GPa which is a little lower than steel which has a tensile strength of 1.65 GPa. Tensile strength refers to the stress that any material can bear before breaking.

Spider web thread is not as dense as steel and makes a much lighter material. Considering it’s almost five times as strong as a thread of the same weight made from steel, it is a material that scientists have been trying to replicate. Rather unsuccessfully as so far the material that has been formed used harsh chemicals and had an extremely limited use.

Now scientists at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences and Karolinska Institute have come up with a new step wise method for biomimetic spinning of artificial spider silk. The researchers focused on the protein in spider’s web silk which was water soluble and then used an artificial protein which was also water soluble in the creation process.

Anna Rising, says that their science project has come up with the first successful example of biomimetic spider silk spinning. They designed a process that recapitulates many of the complex molecular mechanisms of native silk spinning. In the future this may allow industrial production of artificial spider silk for biomaterial applications or for the manufacture of advanced textiles