HONG KONG: A common type of spider has been discovered to have the ability to trap and subdue its prey using electrically charged silk webs.
Researchers have been interested in spider silk for years because of its amazingly high tensile strength for its thickness. Now scientists are gaining new insights on the smallest of the small: the ultra-thin web silk of a particular kind of spider called the “garden centre spider” or “feather-legged lace weaver,” Uloborus plumipes.
This common British spider spins fibers much thinner than other spiders and has experts exploring how they can learn from the little arachnid so that they can mimic its process in nano-scale filament synthesis.
Scientists at the University of Oxford collected adult female U. plumipes lace weavers from garden centers in Hampshire, U.K. and observed them using three different microscopy techniques. Their findings are reported in the most recent issue of the journal of the British Royal Society called Biology Letters.
“Uloborus has unique cribellar glands, amongst the smallest silk glands of any spider, and it’s these that yield the ultra-fine ‘catching wool’ of its prey capture thread,” said Katrin Kronenberger of Oxford University’s Department of Zoology, the report’s first author. “The raw material, silk dope, is funnelled through exceptionally narrow and long ducts into tiny spinning nozzles or spigots. Importantly, the silk seems to form only just before it emerges at the uniquely-shaped spigots of this spider.”
