Thursday, October 1, 2009

Most Amazing Textile made with Spider Silk!!

This 11-foot-long cloth is woven from the thread of golden orb spiders will be at the American Museum of Natural History starting Thursday.

What makes it amazing you ask?

-Only the females produce the silk, which is renowned for both its striking saffron color and its tensile strength (five to six times stronger than steel by weight).

-the spider would then be placed in a harness, with 23 others, and sit more or less patiently as a spool tugged the rest of its web out in continuous threads that could sometimes stretch as long as 400 yards before the spider had given its all.

-Not one thread ever broke on the loom — it’s that strong!


For a link to the entire article featured in the New York Times click here


source:
Published: September 22, 2009

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