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Science

Scientists Crack Silk's Secret 408

Posted by CmdrTaco from the screw-cotton dept.
AEton writes "Researchers at Tufts University have reportedly discovered the mechanism by which spidersilk is produced. Besides the obvious use as a Kevlar substitute in bulletproof vests, silk has applications in microprocessor production, nanoscale optical fiber, a and any other application requiring strength and flexbility. Scientists have long grappled with the issue of creating silk; artificial silk is inferior to the real stuff, and the spiders can't be farmed (when you put them too close together, they eat each other). The method these Tufts researchers have found makes "strong silk" production feasible; if they can make it economical, the impact on safety equipment alone makes this material a worthwhile investment."
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Scientists Crack Silk's Secret More

Scientists Crack Silk's Secret

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  • A changing world... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by mgcsinc ( 681597 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:11PM (#6839134)
    Scientists develop $5 artificial diamonds and scientists develop economically produced artificial silk; I'd say its been a pretty good time for those who had kept their hopes up for alchemy after the 18th century turned out unfruitful... How long until workers in industries "ruined" by scientific development (though only ever valued for the rareness of their product) develop a cult-like anti-scientific religion and take over the world?

    • Re:A changing world... (Score:4, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:25PM (#6839239)
      I can't wait til they "ruin" the automobile market with artifically manufactored BMW 745 LIs for $20 bucks. I'm gonna be pimpin.

      • Re:A changing world... (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Hentai ( 165906 )
        The value of a status symbol is not in its quality; the value of a status symbol is in its rarity. If a BMW could be manufactured for $20, its "pimp" factor would quickly drop to "ghetto" levels.

    • Re:A changing world... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by NotAnotherReboot ( 262125 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:26PM (#6839247)
      Perhaps the part about changing materials that are next to worthless into something valuable is what you mean by alchemy, but none of this is anything like alchemy. Atoms are not being transformed into the "diamond atom" from the carbon atom, it is still carbon, just in a different form.

      Obviously, the diamond industry has reason to worry if the fakes are indistinguishable, but I'm not sure what you're talking about a "cult-like anti-scientific religion," that is just silly.

      There is nothing wrong with economical silk- after all, how big is the industry, and are the people in it that well off right now? Silk is something with actual applications (diamonds do as well, but not as many). Science marches on and puts people out of work, but at the end of the day, they find another line of work and everyone is better off. The standard of living in the developed world has steadily increased- and most of it is because of science.

      Spare me of the doomsday theories.

      • Re:A changing world... (Score:4, Informative)

        by kd5ujz ( 640580 ) <william@@@ram-gear...com> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @02:32PM (#6839651)
        There is a company, I believe its called gemisis, that is creating diamonds using a laser induced plasma cloud. The diamonds were taken to am inspection lab, and the only way the techs could discern them from natural diamonds was that the artificial ones were too perfect. Diamonds generated by heat and pressure in a lab have more flaws then natural, but the plasma diamonds had too little flaws. I suppose you could dope the chamber with a few minerals and come out with a diamond that was very damn hard to detect. You can read all about it in the latest Wired magazine.

      • Re:A changing world... (Score:3, Interesting)

        by jelle ( 14827 )
        "(diamonds do as well, but not as many)"

        Whoah. You didn't read the gemesis article, did you? There are two very recent artificial diamond producers only now ready to begin production. One of them is gemisis (gemisys/gemysis/whatever). Rumors are that the 'debeers' that now control the worldwide diamond supply are pretty worried about those recent development. But ironically it is not a taking over of the 'debeers' diamond markets that either of these companies is aiming for. They both are quoted to say tha

    • Sacrifice a spider-silk goat (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:29PM (#6839269)
      How long until workers in industries "ruined" by scientific development ... develop a cult-like anti-scientific religion and take over the world?

      I imagine a bizarre cult of disgruntled former Kevlar workers sacrificing one of the spider-silk goats.

      What ever happened with the spider-silk goat and cow experiments anyway? Or is that how they got enough material for the current breakthrough?

      Hey! HEY! Stop that! No goatse links!

    • It's not the same thing, though. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by cyberwench ( 10225 ) <tunalei@gmail.com> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @02:06PM (#6839505)
      There isn't currently a spider-silk industry. There's a silk industry, but from what I understand the whole point of spider silk as opposed to silkworm silk (which is at least relatively easily harvested), is that spiders have stronger silk with many more applications. So realistically, what we have here is not one industry "ruining" another, it's an entirely new industry that's being added. It's not like the spiders are going to get upset about us taking over their industry.

      On the topic of displaced workers though - there's always going to be a demand for "the real thing". While artificially produced diamonds may be exactly the same as naturally formed ones, for many people they are two entirely different things. It's all a question of perception. As long as people view the two things differently, there will always be a market for the rarer and consequently more expensive natural diamonds.
      • There can only be a market for "the real thing" if it's distinguishable from the "artificial" one. In the case of diamonds, the only distinction is that the artificial diamonds are too perfect. However, as someone already pointed out, it's quite likely that impurities can be added to the artificial diamonds in such a way that the two are indistinguishable. You can go to your corner jeweler, and he can swear that it's a natural diamond, but if there's absolutely no way to tell for sure, how will you know?

        • Re:It's not the same thing, though. (Score:4, Interesting)

          by shaitand ( 626655 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @07:57PM (#6841351) Journal
          nope, doping the diamonds won't work. It's not the presence of impure minerals in the diamond or lack thereof that make them distinguishable. Your local jewler will NEVER be able to tell the difference looking at this throuh any sort of magnification from a natural flawless diamond.

          It's the actual structure of the diamond on a molecular level that is too perfect. DeBeers themselves with their absolute mod sophisticated equiptment SUSPECT they will be able to identify them... but there is nothing in existing grading labs that can, and your local jeweler certainly cannot.

          But this mute and actually supports what your saying. The diamond market has been artificially kept afloat to this point. Contrary to popular belief diamonds are NOT rare, and I mean the natural ones. DeBeers simply controls the market by making sure all diamonds funnel through them and releasing them very slowly.

          In short this is an industry that exists in it's present form with inflated prices only because of a fraud. It's about damn time someone shut them down. Real jewelers have plenty of other items of jewelry they can sell, and there is nothing to stop them from selling diamonds, just not for thousands of dollars. Your corner jeweler won't go out of business because of this, but debeers will and it's about time they do.
      • There are currently bio-engineers producing spidersilk using genetically engineered goats...

        thats a whole other discussion wether it is ethical to engineer goats to make them produce spidersilk...

        google search [google.be]

      • Re:It's not the same thing, though. (Score:4, Interesting)

        by TTK Ciar ( 698795 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @11:25PM (#6842333) Homepage Journal

        I have to agree.

        There is already a material being produced which is superior to spiders' silk in every way -- stronger, lighter, higher elongation-to-break, and easier to mass produce. It is called ultra-high molecular weight high-density polyethylene. Spectra is one form of the stuff; Dyneema is a superior form.

        UM-HDPE is basically the same stuff that garbage bags are made of ("ordinary" HDPE), but the polyethylene chains in it are several tens of thousands of times longer. This was made possible by the discovery of a new process by which to build the PE chains, using a new catalyst (and lots and lots of MAO, which always cracks me up).

        UM-HDPE production has been ramping up slowly over the past several years. In time, we should expect it to be fairly commonplace and inexpensive (Dyneema is currently extremely pricey stuff, due to limited production). So cracking the silk "code" is nothing to get riled up about, at least not from a material engineer's perspective. It's a johnny-come-latey. I seriously doubt its production could be ramped up any faster than Dyneema's, and Dyneema has a huge head start.

        -- TTK

    • Re:A changing world... (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Scientists develop $5 artificial diamonds and scientists develop economically produced artificial silk; I'd say its been a pretty good time for those who had kept their hopes up for alchemy...

      Actually, it's a pretty good time to be a pimp. Now if only they could make $5 artificial fur that was as good as the real thing...

    • Re:A changing world... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Elwood P Dowd ( 16933 ) <judgmentalist@gmail.com> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @02:18PM (#6839571) Journal
      Talk to someone from Morning Star Fellowship Church [eaglestar.org] about evolution for a little while. Ultra-fundie weirdo non-denominational protestantism is sweeping the nation. I don't think luddites could scare me more.

    • Re:A changing world... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by eyegone ( 644831 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @02:39PM (#6839697)
      How long until workers in industries "ruined" by scientific development (though only ever valued for the rareness of their product) develop a cult-like anti-scientific religion and take over the world?

      Ever heard of De Beers?

    • Re:A changing world... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by nhavar ( 115351 )
      These major corporations don't allow their industries to be "ruined". Take a look at the diamond industry. There you have a material that is actually quite abundant but kept in a fake myth of "rarity". Scientists can produce diamonds in a lab much cheaper than digging it out of the ground and yet people still buy diamonds. Part of that is the hype machine behind the diamond industry and the other part is this monopoly of the natural diamond keeping a hold on how many diamonds are in the market.

      The industri

    • Re:A changing world... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Epistax ( 544591 )
      I think this is very good. I very much enjoy the prospect of what is seen as very valuable becoming dirt cheap. These things are of value simply because they are rare and/or hard to make. If you stand to lose a lot of money from this no longer being so, perhaps you should have invested more astutely.

      A good idea which obsoletes a million jobs is still a good idea, imho.
    • you address the basic problem with automation in a capitalist society. when jobs are 'automated' out of existance, the people who worked them are thrown out onto the street. new masturbatory jobs need to be created just to keep people busy.

      i mean, sooner or later the only job left is going to be robot polisher..either everyone who doesn't get that job starves or we find another system for handing the allocation of work... i've always liked r.a. wilsons idea in the schroedingers cat trilogy of offering $5

  • Aaww (Score:4, Funny)

    by Rosco P. Coltrane ( 209368 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:14PM (#6839159)
    the spiders can't be farmed (when you put them too close together, they eat each other)

    Why can't everybody be nice to each other ?? :-(
    • Why can't everybody be nice to each other ?? :-(

      Life feeds on life.

      Two very large spiders in my back yard -- Feeding or Fucking? [jacefuse.com] You decide.

  • Eh? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by rde ( 17364 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:16PM (#6839176)
    Well, I've read the article. I've read Scientific American [sciam.com]'s version. I've read a few other ones google referenced. And I still haven't a fucking clue why silk is so strong.

    Am I getting dumber, or are these science article getting more opaque?

    "becuase of proteins with various properties" me arse.
    • That's the $64 question....why?

      Why is it more capable than what man can do it a lab? Answer that and print your own money...

      • Re:Eh? (Score:4, Insightful)

        by i am fishhead ( 580982 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:54PM (#6839448) Homepage
        Well, strong but flexable silk gives the spiders that spin it a pretty good reproductive advantage over those that don't. Over time, natural selection will favor those spiders with strong but thin (and, as such, difficult to see) webs. It's not too suprising that scientists are no match for millions of years of evolution.
        • ...exactly. What is surprising is that us stoopid humans think we can match all those years with a few visits to the lab :)

        • Re:Eh? (Score:5, Insightful)

          by danila ( 69889 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @02:36PM (#6839671) Homepage
          I am really disturbed by the tendency of people to proclaim "scientists are no match for millions of years of evolution" after scientists understand (somewhat) another mystery. Look, this achievement is the first step after a long preparatory work. Now for the first time scientists really understand what is going on. Yes, they still don't know some aspects of the process, but they are just getting started. The area of bionics is booming. Just recently we could read in the news that engineers are building submarines that swim without propellers - by moving the "tail" instead. Yes, their crude attempts are no match for a dolphin, but give them time. We have supersonic aicrafts, we have spaceships, we can dig more than 10km deep into the Earth, we can move from the ocean surface into the Mariana trench in the same craft, we can build moving objects weighting million tons! Can the nature do that? Did the evolution do that? The answer is a resounding no!

          So wait a few years (at most a decade) and artificial spider silk will be stronger than natural. After a decade more we will have not only stronger, but ligher, more flexible, cheaper and overall better threads than any spider will ever have. Evolution is too slow and we gave it a huge start - billions of years. And we are gaining on it now.
        • Reverse engineering is always cheaper than invention. Luckily mother nature holds no patents. Of course that means we have no documents to work off of so we have to do the more laborious reverse engineering.

    • Re:Eh? (Score:5, Informative)

      by pajamacore ( 613970 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:24PM (#6839233)
      Searching ScAm's Ask the Expert [sciam.com] section, I found the following:

      "Dragline silk [a kind of silk all spiders make] is a composite material comprised of two different proteins, each containing three types of regions with distinct properties. One of these forms an amorphous (noncrystalline) matrix that is stretchable, giving the silk elasticity. When an insect strikes the web, the stretching of the matrix enables the web to absorb the kinetic energy of the insects flight. Embedded in the amorphous portions of both proteins are two kinds of crystalline regions that toughen the silk. Although both kinds of crystalline regions are tightly pleated and resist stretching, one of them is rigid. It is thought that the pleats of the less rigid crystalline regions not only fit into the pleats in the rigid crystals but that they also interact with the amorphous areas in the proteins, thus anchoring the rigid crystals to the matrix. The resulting composite is strong, tough, and yet elastic."

      • Re:Eh? (Score:3, Insightful)

        by terrox ( 555131 )
        but the elasticity comes from the sticky quality right? is it possible to retain the elastic quality without it being sticky?

        who wants sticky clothing? yuk.

        • Re:Eh? (Score:4, Interesting)

          by mrgeometry ( 689087 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @02:39PM (#6839698)
          but the elasticity comes from the sticky quality right? is it possible to retain the elastic quality without it being sticky?

          Good question, but as there are lots of elastic yet non-sticky things out there, I would think that it should be possible to make non-sticky clothing out of this stuff.

          Maybe the spiders can decide whether or not to add an extra "stickiness" protein to the silk as they extrude it, so they can make non-sticky support strands for their webs. That way they could walk around without getting themselves stuck---or maybe they have some weird foot-based non-stick thing.

          Also, is silk from silkworms sticky?

          OK, I don't know any of the answers, so those are just a few thoughts on the topic.

          Just imagine, if every super-bouncy ball were also super-sticky... :-)

          • How come spiders don't get stuck? Easy. (Score:4, Informative)

            by devphil ( 51341 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @09:15PM (#6841749) Homepage
            Maybe the spiders can decide whether or not to add an extra "stickiness" protein to the silk as they extrude it, so they can make non-sticky support strands for their webs. That way they could walk around without getting themselves stuck---or maybe they have some weird foot-based non-stick thing.

            Nope, you had it right the first time. Some strands of a spider's web are sticky, some are not. It's not for "extra support for the web" as it is "it's nice to be able to walk around without sticking to my own house." The spiders know which strands are which. And if they have to step on a sticky strand, they just pull themselves loose.

  • Weapon against crime? (Score:4, Funny)

    by hahn ( 101816 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:17PM (#6839182) Homepage
    So does this mean we're going to start arming the cops with spidersilk so they can assist Spiderman in his pursuit of justice? Cool!

  • DMCA (Score:4, Funny)

    by kamakot ( 661425 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:18PM (#6839186)
    Let's just hope the spiders don't use the DMCA against the scientists.

  • aaww no (Score:3, Funny)

    by deputydink ( 173771 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:18PM (#6839188)
    fuck! not again dude, its totally time to dump those shares in First Mandarin Silk Co.
  • ... but isn't it that the larvae of a kind of moth that produces silk for fabric industry use? The larvae spinds the silk to form a cocoon, and people uses the cocoon to make silk thread.

  • Spider farming (Score:5, Funny)

    by cybermace5 ( 446439 ) <g.ryan@macetech.com> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:19PM (#6839194) Homepage Journal
    Do you honestly think anyone EVER seriously considered farming spiders for their silk? The idea of unimaginable numbers of spiders all together is chilling even to the bravest of us. And of course they'd discover that black widows or brown recluses or giant bird spiders produced the strongest silk, and then they would escape....
    *shudder*

    • Re:Spider farming (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Daniel Dvorkin ( 106857 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:38PM (#6839331) Homepage Journal
      AFAIK, there have been several attempts to farm spiders, actually. Sure, spiders are creepy and potentially dangerous, but that's not why the attempts failed. (Having once been caught in the middle of an honest-to-God cattle stampede, I can tell you that a bunch of cows are scarier than a bunch of spiders any day of the week -- which, obviously, doesn't keep us from raising the critters.) The problem is that spiders are just stubborn; they spin webs pretty much only when they feel like it. Silkworms, OTOH, will turn out silk all day if you keep them fed.

      Again, this is all AFAIK, based on stuff I heard a long time ago.
      • The problem is that spiders are just stubborn; they spin webs pretty much only when they feel like it.

        Must be distantly related to cats...

    • Re:Spider farming (Score:3, Interesting)

      by dspeyer ( 531333 )
      Why not? We farm bees for their honey. I say that's a lot scarier (creepy and they sting!). We also bring beehives to fruit orchards to improve production (bees create more fruit then artificial insemination; no idea why but it's repeatable).

      We also farm silkworms for their sort of silk. So why not spiders?

    • Re:Spider farming (Score:5, Informative)

      by Tsu Dho Nimh ( 663417 ) <abacaxi.hotmail@com> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:58PM (#6839468)
      Welcome to your nightmare, come true. Spiders WERE farmed by Zeiss, Bausch & Lomb and others, and black widows had the best silk
      http://us.expasy.org/spotlight/articles/sptlt024 .html
      "Spider silk is 40 times finer than human hair and right up to World War II, it was used for crosshairs in optical devices such as microscopes, guns and bomb-guiding systems. In fact, though crosshairs are now etched or made with metal filaments, some military facilities still keep a domesticated black widow spider as a silk provision for old instruments. To this day, Australian aborigines use the silk of a giant spider for fishing lines."

      Knowing how to collect Black Widow silk is essential if you are repairing and restoring old microscopes and other optical equipment. They are not aggressive, and live a long time, and are content in a very small container.

      • One question: how in hell do you domesticate a black widow?!

        • Re:Spider farming (Score:5, Interesting)

          by Tsu Dho Nimh ( 663417 ) <abacaxi.hotmail@com> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @02:46PM (#6839735)
          uh ... very carefully, of course :)

          They aren't really "domesticated", just captured in the wild and kept in a container, such as a terrarium. A couple of crickets a week keeps them fed. There is one spider farm locally, collecting venom for research and anti-venin production. They use plastic refrigerator containers, and have well-sealed buildings. They have a small group of collectors - instead of raising the spiders, they buy mature females as needed.

          I have an old microscope repair manual that explained how one gets the silk from the spider ... if I recall you put the spider in a rather large container, with a tiny shelter at the top. They will run a long strand from the shelter down to the bottom of the container and make their messy trap web there, of sticky strands. You harvest the long strand on a loop of wire and then lay the strand onto the glass reticule, usin gan alignment jig. It's sticky enough to cling to the glass.

  • Different silks? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by hahn ( 101816 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:20PM (#6839201) Homepage
    This brings up an interesting question. Does anyone know what the difference is in properties between the silkworm's silk and the spider's silk?

  • Business potential! (Score:4, Funny)

    by Dark Lord Seth ( 584963 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:21PM (#6839205) Journal

    Next up, Seth Industries & Automobiles! Silksteel cars with diamond windshields and pistons and of course a dimensional warp generator [museumofhoaxes.com]!

    • Incidentally; some decades ago Henry Ford prototyped a car all of whose structural members and body panels were made of hemp-derived plastics. Some engines being prototyped for (and possibly used in by now?) racing have a carbon fiber "block" (it's not really a block now is it) with metal sleeves to build the cylinders. I can't wait for the diamond coatings, and the diamond nuts and bolts, though. Imagine never snapping off another bolt head and having to extract a broken bolt from the engine block... ahh.

  • One unfortuate side effect... (Score:5, Funny)

    by One Louder ( 595430 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:21PM (#6839208)
    However, you can't have too many silk researchers working on the project - when you put them too close together, they eat each other.

  • This is old (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Wyatt Earp ( 1029 )
    There were stories about the "discovery" of how spider silk self-assembled a while back.

    Of course, I've not read the article linked above.

    http://www.exn.ca/Stories/2000/06/19/56.asp

    I can't find it now, but they talked last year about how they'd figured out how the spiders assembled the strands and that they'd applied that to a industrial method to pull the unassmbled silk through a small hole and it would self-assemble.

  • Finally! (Score:5, Funny)

    by slackingme ( 690217 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:24PM (#6839224) Homepage Journal
    Yes, finally! We can start producing super-strong silk boxers to protect all us sexy geeks from the swarms of girls outside our rooms. Personally, I'm all for reducing user latency in the kernel and reading the latest rant by RMS, but *indestructable silk boxers* get me really excited. I'm blowing through several pairs a week when I leave the dark, secluded safety of my room to get more gin and tonic at the store. I certainly can't make the swarm go away, but this takes care of a symptom!

  • Gee, Tufts University? Now THAT is a truly appropriate place for them to have made such a breakthrough discovery in the science of spider silk. ;)

  • Spider Farming (Score:5, Funny)

    by SuperBanana ( 662181 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:26PM (#6839251)
    Scientists have long grappled with the issue of creating silk; artificial silk is inferior to the real stuff, and the spiders can't be farmed (when you put them too close together, they eat each other)

    I don't suppose it occured to any of these rocket scientists to put the spiders in seperate cages.

    ...or better yet, genetically modify the spiders to be nice! Perfect plot for a B-grade movie with LL Cool J; the spiders are only PRETENDING to be nice! Mwuahahahaha...


  • As advanced as we think we are, it takes the discovery of how to do what seems like the mundane of how to make diamonds and silk to realize that we have such a long way to go.

    We still can't store electricity efficiently.

  • Another Application (Score:5, Interesting)

    by tunabomber ( 259585 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:29PM (#6839270) Homepage
    You don't suppose this stuff could be strong enough to make a space elevator [space.com], could it?
    • Not a hope, sorry.

    • Re:Another Application (Score:2, Informative)

      by aiyo ( 653781 )
      Nope, sorry. If we used steel for a space elevator the cable would have to be as wide as the milky way. If we used something like kevlar or silk the cable would have to be as wide as the earth (better than steel but still not fesible). If we used carbon nanotubes the cable will only have to be 6 inches wide at the top.

    • Re:Another Application (Score:4, Funny)

      by meringuoid ( 568297 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @04:53PM (#6840406)
      Until quite recently, spider silk had the highest tensile strength of any substance known to man, and the name Silksteel pays homage to the arachnid for good reason.
      -- Commissioner Pravin Lal, "U.N. Scientific Survey", on the discovery of Silksteel Alloys

      In one moment, Earth; in the next, Heaven.
      -- Academician Prokhor Zakharov, "For I Have Tasted The Fruit", on the construction of the Space Elevator

      Unfortunately, Silksteel Alloys are not sufficient to construct the space elevator. That calls for Super-Tensile Solids, which is quite a lot more advanced...

  • Farming Spiders (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:41PM (#6839353)
    "the spiders can't be farmed (when you put them too close together, they eat each other)."

    hey, not so fast. :)

    check out this cbc article [www.cbc.ca] and click through to the photo gallery to get really creeped out.

    that's one whole lotta silk. i'd still like to know who/what they ate to do that. and i'd really, really like to know what biochem outfit owns land nearby.

  • Cracked? (Score:2, Funny)

    by S.I.O. ( 180787 )
    ./ is becoming a warez news site? I haven't played "Silk's Secret" yet, but its publisher is surely very unhappy with this and may sue the "Sc1ent1sts".

  • spider silk is _not_ the same as SiLK (Score:5, Informative)

    by sarpedon77 ( 159241 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:46PM (#6839389) Homepage
    SiLK which is used for microprocessor applications is not connected in any way to spider silk. The former is an acronymn for a resin
    (aromatic hydrocarbon) made by Dow Chemicals and used by IBM and other chip companies as an insulator between the multiple layers of wires on a chip. Silicon Low-K = SiLK

  • Excerpts from SCO press release on the subject (Score:4, Funny)

    by Trailer Trash ( 60756 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:46PM (#6839390) Homepage
    "It's obvious that they couldn't have discovered the secret to making silk that quickly without access to SCO's intellectual property," said Darl McBride, SCO's president. He continued, "In 1999, they were making some silk, but it was low quality. Then, suddenly, over the course of a year or so, their silk became enterprise quality. Stuff that took other people 30 years took them months."

    In a move considered to be brilliant in the business world, SCO bought the patents on silk production from God in 2000 for an undisclosed sum. "We've been looking to leverage those patents ever since" said McBride.

    Right now, SCO isn't planning on suing individual spiders, although they won't rule out the possibility. "We've considering going after some of the nuisance species, such as brown recluses and black widows, first," said Chris Sontag. "We've been warned by our attorneys that doing such would expose us to the possibilities of bites and nasty wounds, so it's really something we don't want to do right now."

    Eric Raymond, president of the Open Silk Initiative, says that God lost protection on His silk production techniques by creating so many different species that use the intellectual property and not entering into any official licensing agreement with them. "It's a little late to be worrying about that now", said Raymond. A 1993 lawsuit regarding silk production methods also cast doubt on the validity of the patents.

    Meanwhile, some spiders have openly questioned Raymonds repeated assertions that he represents them or their opinions in these matters.

  • Forget the bullet-proof vests! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Tsu Dho Nimh ( 663417 ) <abacaxi.hotmail@com> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:48PM (#6839409)
    I want run-proof stockings and sexy lingerie out of this stuff.

  • What about the goat milk spider silk? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by cyberwench ( 10225 ) <tunalei@gmail.com> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @01:54PM (#6839446)
    A Quebec company, Nexia, has genetically engineered goats to produce spider silk within their milk. (Apparently, the way mammary glands work and the way a spider's silk glands work are remarkably similar.) I know that they've been able to pass the genes on to offspring, and they are getting silk from the milk now. I think it is supposed to be as strong as dragline silk, which is the strongest type of spider silk.


    I understand from the article that they've figured out how strong silk is actually produced, which should give them a heads-up on making a mechanical/chemical process to do all this artificially. It should be pointed out, though, that there are already means for production of non-artificial spider silk currently, which the article seems to have missed.

  • I farm spiders... (Score:4, Funny)

    by tjstork ( 137384 ) <todd.bandrowsky@ ... UGARom minus cat> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @02:14PM (#6839548) Homepage Journal

    I have this piece of wood in the back yard covered with spiders. Guess they should have called me... :-)

  • Cannot decide what to be afraid of (Score:3, Interesting)

    by switcha ( 551514 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @02:24PM (#6839611)
    the spiders can't be farmed (when you put them too close together, they eat each other).

    Poor spiders. When in close confines, do you diagnose then with Arachnapobia or Autophobia [geocities.com] (fear of yourself)?

  • These poor defenseless spiders are being abused by the evil corporate silk manufactures, they are being held against their will to produce more of a substance than nature dictates they should...

    Wait a second, I have arachnaphobia, STICK IT TO EM!

  • Robert A Heinlein (Score:4, Interesting)

    by LittleLebowskiUrbanA ( 619114 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @03:23PM (#6839911) Homepage Journal
    I can't remember what the name of the Heinlein novel but the novel or short story talked extensively about construction on an asteroid and how some of the work wouldn't be possible without synthetic spider webbing. Looks like Heinlein was ahead of his times again.

  • worms.. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Suppafly ( 179830 ) <slashdot@s[ ]afly.net ['upp' in gap]> on Sunday August 31, 2003 @03:43PM (#6840031)
    I was under the impression that silk was made by worms and not spiders.

  • Spiders CAN be farmed (Score:3, Interesting)

    by BanjoBob ( 686644 ) on Sunday August 31, 2003 @07:13PM (#6841139) Homepage Journal
    Redfield Gunsight used to have a whole area in their factory of black-widown spiders. They farmed them and valued them very much. If a spider was missing, they would issue an alert to locate the spider and return it to its home.

    The web from the black-widow spider was used to make the cross-hairs in their scopes. During the prime of their business, Redfield scopes were some of the very best ever made. All thanks to the silk from the black-widow spider farm.

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