Anyone from Australia? Scoop up this bounty of spider webs and make some lute strings for us! http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/17273309
-----Original Message----- From: alexander <[email protected]> To: Ron Andrico <[email protected]> Cc: agno3phile <[email protected]>; tom <[email protected]>; lute <[email protected]> Sent: Wed, Mar 7, 2012 9:54 am Subject: [LUTE] Re: Violin strings out of spider's thread (objective blind test?) I seriously doubt there is an interest in the mechanics of the subject on this ist, which are rather complex. It matters to say that the spider silk research s an immensely long and difficult endeavor, without a clear end in sight. The ultured silk research, going on for some 600 years, still regularly surprises he heck out of itself. t is generally agreed that, with small variations, all the silks, be it moths r spiders, or some fishes and mammals (yes!) consist of pretty much the same lements - fibroin, based on the proteins similar to our hair and fingernails, ust in somewhat different proportions and mixtures, and a glue holding ilaments together, in case of moths and spiders - sericin. he sometimes enormous strength of spider silk results not from its' omposition, but rather from the spacial arrangement of the filaments, supported y the smart bends and nicks with a judicial dab of glue here and there, both on micro and macro level. and this is where the enormous amount of research goes n. TO make a useful musical strings, this spacial arrangement needs to be vercome and some new one created, which cancels all the wonderful inventiveness he spider just put into the process... The glue bits are melted in the process, nd the fancy curly hair go straight, as the perm in the shower. Sure it gives he one who makes such a string a painless pastime, and lots of it, and then espect for being persistent, and girls and free drinks that follow. But as far s the string goes, - nothing fancy here, exactly because of the necessary traightening of the tiny filaments to arrange them laterally into the string. his destroys the fancy spider's footwork. uriously enough, the gut strings, on the other hand, completely preserve the atices of arrangement among the filaments, as they are too strong and too fancy o be destroyed by the processing and stretching. You see, the gut is never aken apart into tiny filaments, as silk is. This gives gut strings all the ualities we all love and enjoy. O see the following links, remove spaces in http. t t p://web.mit.edu/course/3/3.064/www/slides/Ko_spider_silk.pdf t t p://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero/2012/01/spider-silk-va t t p://theheritagetrust.wordpress.com/2012/01/25/rare-spider-silk-textile-on-display-at-the-victoria-albert-museum/ lexander r. n Wed, 07 Mar 2012 13:23:12 +0000 on Andrico <[email protected]> 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 ttp://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html --
