Bacteria produced spider silk could replace Kevlar and more
Researchers have developed a method of processing and harnessing synthetic spider silk from bacteria. The process was perfected using a key step called "post-spin”, which is a critical step in the process that takes silk molecules and stretches them using a mechanical actuator to increase fiber strength.
According to researchers involved with the experiment, the use of a mechanical actuator improves the production by making uniform spider silk and removing human error from the spinning process. The result is a synthetic silk that's much closer to the natural fiber produced by a female black widow spider than was possible previously.
The synthetic process provides a scalable first step toward using spider silk as a material in manufacturing.
The mechanical properties of the synthetic spider silk give it numerous manufacturing and industrial applications. One key area of application involves the high-tensile strength of black widow silk, which is comparable to Kevlar in strength, but is lighter and lower density. That means that if the scientists could create a mass production method for synthetic spider silk the same properties as natural spider silk, the material could possibly replace Kevlar, carbon fiber, and steel in many products. The material could be used in products such as bulletproof vests, steel bridge cables, medical devices, and in aircraft.
Dr. Craig Vierra, the researchers that developed the mechanical actuator, and his team hope to make synthetic spider silk a renewable source of material for production of all sorts of items. Dr. Vierra said, "The procedure decreases the variance in the mechanical properties that are seen. Before this procedure, there was a tremendous amount of variation in synthetic fibers."
He continued, "We're working on fusing what we've learned here and expanding the procedure en masse."
Source: Jove
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