I seriously doubt there is an interest in the mechanics of the subject on this list, which are rather complex. It matters to say that the spider silk research is an immensely long and difficult endeavor, without a clear end in sight. The cultured silk research, going on for some 600 years, still regularly surprises the heck out of itself. It is generally agreed that, with small variations, all the silks, be it moths or spiders, or some fishes and mammals (yes!) consist of pretty much the same elements - fibroin, based on the proteins similar to our hair and fingernails, just in somewhat different proportions and mixtures, and a glue holding filaments together, in case of moths and spiders - sericin. The sometimes enormous strength of spider silk results not from its' composition, but rather from the spacial arrangement of the filaments, supported by the smart bends and nicks with a judicial dab of glue here and there, both on a micro and macro level. and this is where the enormous amount of research goes on. TO make a useful musical strings, this spacial arrangement needs to be overcome and some new one created, which cancels all the wonderful inventiveness the spider just put into the process... The glue bits are melted in the process, and the fancy curly hair go straight, as the perm in the shower. Sure it gives the one who makes such a string a painless pastime, and lots of it, and then respect for being persistent, and girls and free drinks that follow. But as far as the string goes, - nothing fancy here, exactly because of the necessary straightening of the tiny filaments to arrange them laterally into the string. This destroys the fancy spider's footwork. Curiously enough, the gut strings, on the other hand, completely preserve the latices of arrangement among the filaments, as they are too strong and too fancy to be destroyed by the processing and stretching. You see, the gut is never taken apart into tiny filaments, as silk is. This gives gut strings all the qualities we all love and enjoy. TO see the following links, remove spaces in http. h t t p://web.mit.edu/course/3/3.064/www/slides/Ko_spider_silk.pdf h t t p://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero/2012/01/spider-silk-va h t t p://theheritagetrust.wordpress.com/2012/01/25/rare-spider-silk-textile-on-display-at-the-victoria-albert-museum/
alexander r. On Wed, 07 Mar 2012 13:23:12 +0000 Ron Andrico <praelu...@hotmail.com> wrote: > I feel inclined to point out that we have one of the foremost > authorities on silk strings contributing to this list, Alex Rakov. > While spider silk may vary slightly from typical silkworm stuff, I'm > sure they behave in a similar fashion. Alex? > RA To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
