Eight legs good!

Journal article

Rheology is the study of the flow and deformation of matter, which is used for examining visco-elastic properties of engineering materials such as paints, polymers and food. The technology is also used in understanding how nature produces one of her finest materials, silk. Silk is a biological material, a protein fibre produced through a process called spinning. A straightforward tensile testing was used to stretch silk fibres to determine physical properties such as stiffness and energy absorption. The researchers were able to control the production rate (reeling speed) of a silk by harmlessly pinning the spider to a polystyrene block and silking it onto a reel. It was found that it is possible to produce silks from the same feedstock with a wide range of mechanical properties in conjunction with varying temperature and humidity. It was also concluded that in order for nature to spin a high performance fibre these feedstocks are under evolutionary constraints to have a particular set of rheological properties.

Authors: Holland, C

• Publication status: Published
• Journal: TCE
• Issue: 815
• Pages: 24-26
• Publication date: 2009-05-01
• ISSN: 0302-0797
• Language: English