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MIT Labs Moves Ahead In Synthesizing Spider Silk

Posted by Zonk on Sun Jan 21, 2007 02:14 AM
from the spiderweave-cap-of-the-bear dept.
Science
icepick72 writes in with a link to an ExtremeTech article on new methods for creating synthetic spider silk. This material, like lycra in many ways, has a number of unique properties. The MIT lab that created it is being monitored by military elements, keenly interested in applications of this material to front-line technologies. From the article: "The secret of spider silk's combined strength and flexibility, according to scientists, has to do with the arrangement of the nano-crystalline reinforcement of the silk as it is being produced--in other words, the way these tiny crystals are oriented towards (and adhere to) the stretchy protein. Emulating this process in a synthetic polymer, the MIT team focused on reinforcing solutions of commercial rubbery substance known as polyurethane elastomer with nano-sized clay platelets instead of simply heating and mixing the molten plastics with reinforcing agents."
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  • I love these kinds of statements (Score:4, Funny)

    by peektwice (726616) on Sunday January 21 2007, @02:18AM (#17700180)

    Scientists have previously suggested that a mere pencil-thick strand of silk could actually stop a Boeing 747 in mid flight.
    Sounds like "It can transmit the entire library of congress in less than a minute."
    If the author of TFA needs to dumb it down for him/herself, fine. But I wish they wouldn't assume that we all have a G.W.Bush I.Q.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by sarahbau (692647)

      Sounds like "It can transmit the entire library of congress in less than a minute."
      If the author of TFA needs to dumb it down for him/herself, fine. But I wish they wouldn't assume that we all have a G.W.Bush I.Q.

      I hate it when they say something like "as long as 4200 garbage trucks lined up end to end." Am I supposed to visualize that? How long is a garbage truck exactly? It would be much easier for me to understand the scale of something if they actually gave the size instead of trying to relate it in terms of something else.

      • 1. When you're trying to visualize something, it's easier to relate it to something you see often. Which do you see more often, 30 rulers lined end to end, or a garbage truck?

        2. Its easier to visualize less of something than more of something. Which is easier to visualize, a TV that is the height of 100,000 grains of sand, or a TV that is the width of a two-person sofa?

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by MindStalker (22827)
          Something like "a 1/4 mile" is much better in my opinion.
        • Most people drive, and will understand distances given in metres to something the length of their trip to the grocery store, or something. At least, that's what I do.

          (~2km to my store of choice, 100m to something closer with fewer choices). /I walk

      • Re:I love these kinds of statements (Score:4, Funny)

        by 91degrees (207121) on Sunday January 21 2007, @06:20AM (#17701020) Journal
        It does depend. Something like "The size of a football pitch" is fine for indicating area. We all know roughly what that looks like. But all too often we see silly examples. Like that 747 example. Is that good? I've never tried stopping a 747 in mid flight. What sort of thickness would you need to lift a person or tow a car? I've seen climbing ropes and towing ropes so I have a frame of reference. And It's bad when there are too many. I've never seen 4200 garbage trucks.

        I remember reading that a particular hangar was "As tall as an olympic swimming pool on its end". This irritated me for two reasons.
        • I've never seen an olympic swimming pool on its end.
        • If you did that, the water would pour out.

    • Re:I love these kinds of statements (Score:5, Funny)

      by Divebus (860563) on Sunday January 21 2007, @03:18AM (#17700430)

      ...a mere pencil-thick strand of silk could actually stop a Boeing 747 in mid flight

      Ohhh... this stuff would make fabulous condoms. They could recover the entire R&D budget in three weekends.

    • If the author of TFA needs to dumb it down for him/herself, fine. But I wish they wouldn't assume that we all have a G.W.Bush I.Q.
      It seemed like quite an illuminating example to me..

      Would you prefer "it can withstand an impulsive force of 4.1x10^7 N"? Do you want to feel smart or just get a feel for what they're up to?
      (For the pedantic; yes that figure may well be off by an order of magnitude.)
      • Your figure could be correct. Using data from Wikipedia for a Boeing 747-400, we have a cruise speed of 913 km/h = 253.6 m/s, and a maximum weight of 396890kg giving a fully loaded aircraft in flight a momentum of 1.01x10^8 kg m s^-1. However the empty weight is less than half this figure, so a lightly loaded 747 flying slowly could have a momentum of 4.1x10^7 kg m s^-1.

        What is wrong though is your unit and your term "impulsive force". Impulse (which is indeed what we should be talking about when we want

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by MadUndergrad (950779)
          That's a rather unfair generalization. I'd say we average about .6wit. There are maybe 10% with their wits about them, 10% totally witless, about 55% are half-wits, and 25% are .8wits. Unfortunately the witless and the halfwits come out in droves, and most vote strait-ticket for whomever opposes gay people and reason.
        • What a stupid generalisation. What about all the quarter-wits?
          • I believe that the term is "he fell ass-backwards into the Presidency".
          • Name.
            All it takes to sway a moron without an opinion is the name.
          • So in your world there is a correlation between political achievement and intelligence?

            My god, which world is this you are from? If this is true it must be a paradise on Earth! If we could but all live there.
            • My god, which world is this you are from? If this is true it must be a paradise on Earth!
              No no, that's the whole idea. It is not on Earth! Silly hunams...
            • Of course there is a correlation between political achievement and intelligence, even on this planet. I think if that if you calculate the coefficient, it will show a strong correlation, something around -0.92 or so.
            • My god, which world is this you are from? If this is true it must be a paradise on Earth! If we could but all live there.

              If we all lived there, it wouldn't be like that any more.

  • Be careful, MIT (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 21 2007, @02:26AM (#17700214)
    With great power comes great responsibility. Remember that, MIT. Remember that.
  • Reproducing the elasticity and strength attributes would be great. It would be even cooler if the synthetic materials developed were also biodegradable.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by paeanblack (191171)
        Except if it were, it would seriously impact the longevity of the product, rendering it useless for things like construction. Who wants a building that's going to fall apart in ten or twenty years because of bacteria eating it?

        Developers, Architects, Engineers, Contractors, Laborers, Brokers, Agents, Lawyers, and everyone else who makes money replacing it.

        The world learned a long time ago that there is no money to be made in selling products that last.
  • "it is being monitored by military elements, keenly interested in applications of this material to front-line technologies"

    I smell another 'non-lethal' crowd control option brewing.

    "Keep them people down with webs, Private!"

    • Kevlar Replacement (Score:5, Informative)

      by Freaky Spook (811861) on Sunday January 21 2007, @03:02AM (#17700374)
      I was watching a show about 10 years into early research into this.

      The biggest interest was extremley light weight bullet proof clothing.

      The military would be very interested if they can get their infantry to loose several kilo's of body armour.
  • I love the fact that no one understands the summary so everyone just tags the article as 'science'.

  • SilkSteel Alloys (Score:3, Informative)

    by SMACX guy (1003684) on Sunday January 21 2007, @04:51AM (#17700680) Homepage
    Until quite recently, spider silk had been the highest tensile strength of any substance known to man, and the name Silksteel pays homage to the arachnid for good reason.
    • Until quite recently, spider silk had been the highest tensile strength of any substance known to man

      This is of course utter bullshit. The advantage of silk is that it doesn't weigh much so the strength to weight ratio is good.

  • This would make a marvelous material for suspension bridges. It could drastically reduce the weight, which means that the foundations don't need to be as massive (read: expensive).

    -jcr
    • The article is light on details but it seems that they are using unmodified linear polyurethane as the polymer base. In that case, prolonged stretching (due to constant load) will lead to extension set, i.e. the polymer will no longer stretch back if the load is removed. It will also sag, as the "pulling" force will decrease over time. This material is probably suitable for intermittent loads only.

  • Not really spider silk but this is. (Score:5, Informative)

    by billlion (101976) on Sunday January 21 2007, @05:18AM (#17700792)
    This work at MIT is not really an attempt to make synthetic spider silk but just something with similar properties.

    Spider silk is a kind made of protein and the feedstock is a liquid crystal

    A company called Spinox Ltd (an Oxford University Spin off -- get it? ha ha ). Here is a note from a Smith Insitute workshop on the topic [smithinst.ac.uk].

    This group is actually trying to emulate what goes on in a spider (biomimetics). The big advantage is that it uses harmless ingredients and low temperatures. Compare for example Kevlar, the manufacture of which needs concentrated sulfuric acid. Spinox details [isis-innovation.com]

    • So what? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by mangu (126918)
      The big advantage is that it uses harmless ingredients and low temperatures. Compare for example Kevlar, the manufacture of which needs concentrated sulfuric acid.

      I'm not sure that's such an advantage. There's concentrated sulfuric acid in car batteries, people have been driving cars for a hundred years, how many people have suffered accidents from battery acid in that time? I mean, compared to overall accidents involving cars?

      Industrial processes often involve nasty chemicals, at dangerous temperatures an

      • GP is probably a troll. Making polyurethane requires phosgene. Sulfuric acid is far less dangerous.
  • Wow, looks like the U.S. Military will be faced with two options for next generation armour -- this and Troy Hurtubise's Anti-Grizzly Suit [wikipedia.org]. I wonder who would win in a fight to the death?
    • Increase your odds for the suit -- its inventor upgraded it recently [slashdot.org].

      Seriously, DARPA has been working with MIT through the Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies [mit.edu] to develop advanced armor, apparently including powered armor.

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by ScrewMaster (602015)
        Starship Troopers, here we come. I remember being very disappointed in the movie version of Heinlein's book, because I was hoping and expecting the Mobile Infantry to have Powered Suits, and really wanted to see what a modern special-effects team could do with the idea. As described by Juan "Johnny" Rico's character from the novel (source: Wikipedia):

        Our suits give us better eyes, better ears, stronger backs (to carry heavier weapons and more ammo), better legs, more intelligence (in the military meaning
    • Give us a break, spiders have about a 400 million year head start on us.
      • So have winged reptiles (birds), and look where we are now after what the Wright Brothers achieved with first flight, in little over a century. What is your point?
          • The Wright brothers developed POWERED flight. That is a hugely different thing than a glider that can ride thermals.

            Powered flight = birds

            Non-powered flight = flying squirrel

            Both are impressive achievements, but be real. The Wright brothers fathered modern air travel.
            • I think you are splitting hairs there, its still flight and it is the only way mankind is going to match and exceed natural flight.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by TapeCutter (624760)
      "large metal spider butts"

      I hear one group tried this, but a soon as one of them mentioned the word "large", the female spider attached to the butt ate the whole group.

      Seriously, I worked in a nylon spinning plant a long time ago and a large knitting machine looks a bit like a spiders butt Howvever, it takes a five story tall "machine" engineered with incredible presicion to make the fine threads that go into a stocking, the static on some parts of the machine can throw a spark over a foot long.

      I d

    • Re:Back to spiders... (Score:5, Informative)

      by Richard Kirk (535523) on Sunday January 21 2007, @07:05AM (#17701220)

      Long chain molecules contain lots of carbon-carbon bonds. The polythene thing you get at the top of a six-pack of beer has lots of these chain molecules, but it is fairly weak. Stretch a bit of it, and you will see a sudden jump between the fat, unstretched material, and the skinnier, stretched material. The stretched stuff is a lot less stretchy. What you have done when you stretched the thing was to align the molecules, so you have chains of carbon-carbon bonds in the direction you have stretched the thing. Mylar - the stuff you sometimes find inside bicycle wheels and protective cloting is strengthened in this way.

      That is only part of the secret. A diamond is made of carbon-carbon bonds in every direction, but you can shatter a diamond, and when you do the energies absorbed by the diamond are pretty tiny. If you want to make something tough, you will need some strategy for the thing to yeild and absorb energy. Metals yeild when they are stressed beyond a certain point, but they can still keep their strength. Carbon fibre materials can crack, but the carbon fibres have two strategies for resisting the crack. The fibres can separate from the glue matrix. If a fibre lies across the gap, then a lot of work is necessary to pull the fibtre free of the matrix as the crack opens. If the fibre lies along the crack, it can stop the crack becayse the crack may run around the fibre surface, and so end up with a blunt tip (the sharper the crack tip is, the more it concentrates the stress). ness of the crack tip .

      Another thing you will probably need in a sting is some ability to absorb energy without yeilding. Steel wire is a lot lighter for the same ability to support load, but climbers do not use it. The first thing a climber's rope needs to do is to absorb the energy from the falling climber. If it does not stretch, then the energy has to be absorbed over a small distance, so the force needed has to be that much bigger. Making where the threads so not go straight up and down have more 'give' in them.

      Okay - I have cut a lot of corners in this explanation. There are scientific terms for strength, hardness, toughness, and things like that that are often confused in ordinary speech. However, I hope I have got across the basics - making long chain molecules isn't enough - you have to make them go up and down the thread; but not straight up and down or the thread will not stretch; and you have to glue them together with something sticky that absorbs energy as it yeilds. A spider's butt probably manages this because it is small, and the spinarets are a complex shape. All the bits seem do-able, but it's a good trick: people have been trying for many years, and we are not close yet. Maybe, there is another trick in there we haven't suspected yet.

      PS: The process probably won't scale. So, you will have thousands of minature spider's butts, rather than one giant one.

      • Nice explanation; I'd like to add that climbers don't use steel cables because, like you said, they absorb the energy of the fall over a short distance - very uncomfortable/dangerous to the climber when he or she falls.

        With a rope you get a nice "stretch" and bounce rather than jerked to a stop and a possible case of whiplash.

        For the same reason, safety lanyards used to tie off in construction have a "bunched" portion that expands under load.
        • Commonly referred to as "static" line, and "shock" line.

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by CharlieG (34950)
          also why seatbelts have a stiched "break away" section - the stitching gives, and slows you before you take the full florce of the belt. Also why you are supposed to replace the seatbelt after a crash (or at least inspect the stiching)
    • Maybe they need Cyborg spiders ala The Web Between The Worlds :)
    • Was that supposed to be funny or do you have no actual understanding of what you're talking about?

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