Naked Science Forum

Non Life Sciences => Chemistry => Topic started by: Bentherdonthat on 13/10/2007 22:09:16

Title: What exactly is a spider web made out of?
Post by: Bentherdonthat on 13/10/2007 22:09:16

Some general vauge statement that it is made out of protien can you be more specific.

Title: What exactly is a spider web made out of?
Post by: sohail on 14/10/2007 22:13:56

A molecule named fibroin aparrently, according to http://www.xs4all.nl/~ednieuw/Spiders/InfoNed/webthread.html.

It's quite an interesting topic actually.

Title: What exactly is a spider web made out of?
Post by: paul.fr on 14/10/2007 22:33:54

But fibroin is a protein, and so is sericin, which is also used to make webs. I thought the person that asked the question, wanted more that just proteins...could be wrong...usually am.

Title: What exactly is a spider web made out of?
Post by: eric l on 15/10/2007 10:21:43

I think there must be at least two different proteins involved, because the web has both sticky fibres and non-sticky fibres (which the spider uses to move about on).
Silk is just an other example of a protein based "spun" fibre, wool is also protein based but of a different nature.