Don鈥檛 mess with a brown recluse spider. They’ve been known to聽听补苍诲 .
But the poisonous little arachnids produce a silk that scientists and companies covet for聽. Unlike other spiders that produce cylindrical silk, the recluse makes a sticky flat ribbon that鈥檚 five times stronger than Kevlar. Scientists describe聽, and hope to use it in everything from聽bullet proofvests听补苍诲聽computer electronics, and聽even as a coating for聽.
One spider, endearingly named聽聽is the subject of a study recently published in Advanced Materials. Researchers say she produces the most reliable and exquisite silk for commercial use.
“Essentially we can ‘milk’ the spider for its silk under controlled conditions,” says scientist Hannes Schniepp, assistant professor of applied science at William & Mary. “That allows the silk to be placed, measured and tested for strength.”
But harvesting the silk and using it is not an easy venture.聽“The protein is insoluble in water and the fiber is so fine鈥1,500 strands are needed to make a thread鈥攖hat firms have had to invent new spinning systems,” 聽Alex Scott explains. “After years of trying to develop commercial spider silk, big companies including DuPont and BASF have dropped out, with the latter pulling the plug on its research just last year.”
If this spider thing works out, we鈥檙e looking at commercial output for fiber-products and textiles by 2016.