4 ms·

What are the advantages of spider silk over modern materials such as kevlar and spectra?

allenz 10y ago
From the article: "it is well tolerated when implanted in tissues, it is light-weight but stronger than steel, and it is also biodegradable". In addition, we know that it's possible to produce protein fibers sustainably.
- ralfd 10y ago
  The biodegradability would make it okay for cloths, but not for much else, doesn't it?
  - allenz 10y ago
    There's plenty of applications for disposable materials such as medical supplies and bulletproof vests. If it's biocompatible, we could use it for flexible sutures and organ scaffolds. Further, proteins are easy to modify. Perhaps we can key the biodegradability to a specific chemical/environmental catalyst, so in normal usage it is as durable as plastic.
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toufka 10y ago
Silk is a protein. That means it's encoded by DNA. Kevlar is ultimately a chemical - not dissimilar from a complicated sugar. To make complicated property changes to a small molecule requires significant R&D and is ultimately not very predictable. To make complicated property changes to a protein is as straightforward as flipping a bit in the DNA that encodes the protein. That can be done for literally $100, overnight. And though still a bit of a messy problem, it's actually significantly easier to predict what will happen when you alter the protein. Further, we have a catalog of amazing material properties pre-made for us (see life - organisms - geckos, flowers, butterflies, birds, etc.) which can be incorporated into the silk protein's DNA at again, near trivial cost. Many will not work, but many will. Tldr: silk is amenable to synthetic biology, older textiles such as Kevlar are products of old-school chemistry and have a limited innovative potential as compared to a genetically encoded material.
- erikpukinskis 10y ago
  I'm pretty sure this is the beginning of the space opera, Alien. Biotech firm synthesizes ultra spider DNA for space silk... new ultra light bio-satellites traverse dark distant planets looking for mining targets...
SEJeff 10y ago
Spider silk is stronger than steel, but not kevlar was my understanding with 1 caveat. It is much lighter than kevlar so it would result in much lighterweight body armor. Also "strength" as in tensile strength is not the same as toughness. Certain types of spiders spin silk that is 10x tougher than kevlar, but I don't believe any silk has a higher tensile strength than kevlar. Having served in the US Army and wore full kevlar vests + ceramic SAPI plates, I can tell you that would be welcomed.
- gozur88 10y ago
  Heh heh. They would just add extra pieces.

From the article: "it is well tolerated when implanted in tissues, it is light-weight but stronger than steel, and it is also biodegradable". In addition, we know that it's possible to produce protein fibers sustainably.

ralfd 10y ago
The biodegradability would make it okay for cloths, but not for much else, doesn't it?
- allenz 10y ago
  There's plenty of applications for disposable materials such as medical supplies and bulletproof vests. If it's biocompatible, we could use it for flexible sutures and organ scaffolds. Further, proteins are easy to modify. Perhaps we can key the biodegradability to a specific chemical/environmental catalyst, so in normal usage it is as durable as plastic.
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toufka 10y ago

Silk is a protein. That means it's encoded by DNA. Kevlar is ultimately a chemical - not dissimilar from a complicated sugar. To make complicated property changes to a small molecule requires significant R&D and is ultimately not very predictable. To make complicated property changes to a protein is as straightforward as flipping a bit in the DNA that encodes the protein. That can be done for literally $100, overnight. And though still a bit of a messy problem, it's actually significantly easier to predict what will happen when you alter the protein. Further, we have a catalog of amazing material properties pre-made for us (see life - organisms - geckos, flowers, butterflies, birds, etc.) which can be incorporated into the silk protein's DNA at again, near trivial cost. Many will not work, but many will. Tldr: silk is amenable to synthetic biology, older textiles such as Kevlar are products of old-school chemistry and have a limited innovative potential as compared to a genetically encoded material.

erikpukinskis 10y ago
I'm pretty sure this is the beginning of the space opera, Alien. Biotech firm synthesizes ultra spider DNA for space silk... new ultra light bio-satellites traverse dark distant planets looking for mining targets...

SEJeff 10y ago

Spider silk is stronger than steel, but not kevlar was my understanding with 1 caveat. It is much lighter than kevlar so it would result in much lighterweight body armor. Also "strength" as in tensile strength is not the same as toughness. Certain types of spiders spin silk that is 10x tougher than kevlar, but I don't believe any silk has a higher tensile strength than kevlar. Having served in the US Army and wore full kevlar vests + ceramic SAPI plates, I can tell you that would be welcomed.

gozur88 10y ago
Heh heh. They would just add extra pieces.