Spider silk - Biomaterial of the future

People talk a lot about the miraculous properties of silk, especially spider silk because the structure of silk is stronger than steel and they can be stretched 40% more than the basic length before breaking.

Spider silk is also 'transformed' in many different forms depending on the interweaving in a spider web with different circumference and different tension.

However, there is an obstacle to the application of the above characteristics that they 'serve' the task of giving, not human. Therefore, studying and applying the next technique is essential for humans to convert spider silk into useful material. This is also the way Dr David Kaplan and colleagues at Tufts University are working hard.

Previous studies have identified DNA sequences in spider silk protein genes that produce different properties of end products. The most important problem of these characteristics is hydrophilia (a tendency to interact with water), hydrophobia (a tendency to stay away from water) and the ability to automatically connect to other proteins, thus creating a large shape. more and more complex construction.

Mr. Kaplan has studied the possibility of extending silk properties beyond those inherent in nature. Later, he discovered and described them in the specialized journal Biomacromolecule.

Through changing the order and amount of hydrophilic, hydrophobic and DNA structural fragments, and then adding the bacteria to transfer the artificial genes created into proteins, he and his colleagues transformed into more than 20 new forms of silk, opening a new page in the history of biofuel development.