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Artificial superstrong silkworm silk surpasses natural spider silks

cell.com

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Re: Artificial superstrong silkworm silk surpasses natural spider silks

#31

Post by netjiro »

beefield wrote: post #26
thorncorona wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can think of a couple: - Durable stringy clothing items - Thinner ropes? Particularly relevant is for safety applications. - Fiber ropes are particularly advantageous when compared to steel ropes in applications that require repeated bending.

Regarding ropes, for most practical applications I can think fro the top of my head, tensile strength is not actually that much of a limiting factor (especially with dyneema), but more the abrasion resistance and how easy it is to handle a rope. I mean, you could in theory rappel from something like 2mm dyneema line with very comfortable safety margin on tensile strength alone, but 1. keeping a say 60m long 2mm line…

if the load bearing core is miniscule and light you have plenty of mass and radius available for abrasion resistance, handling properties, etc ...

Re: Artificial superstrong silkworm silk surpasses natural spider silks

#33

Post by shellfishgene »

beefield wrote: post #26
thorncorona wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can think of a couple: - Durable stringy clothing items - Thinner ropes? Particularly relevant is for safety applications. - Fiber ropes are particularly advantageous when compared to steel ropes in applications that require repeated bending.

Regarding ropes, for most practical applications I can think fro the top of my head, tensile strength is not actually that much of a limiting factor (especially with dyneema), but more the abrasion resistance and how easy it is to handle a rope. I mean, you could in theory rappel from something like 2mm dyneema line with very comfortable safety margin on tensile strength alone, but 1. keeping a say 60m long 2mm line…

Depends on the use case, Zylon is one of the strongest fibers, and is used for rigging in competitive sailing. However it's not UV stable and not good with repetitive bending, so I'd not recommend it for climbing use either...

Re: Artificial superstrong silkworm silk surpasses natural spider silks

#34

Post by marcyb5st »

dsign wrote: post #19

IMO, fibers with very high tensile strength have only two applications worth speaking of: a) Space elevators (but the tensile strength required for that is too high and we are still not close enough), and b) Large O'Neill cylinders, in the radius of about 50 kilometers (about 30 miles). With regards to tensile strength, these would require something with the strength of graphene. This particular fiber seems to have 2…

There's also the use case of ultra high pressure containers to store whatever gas under extreme pressure which is extremely useful in the short term for aerospace industry and exotic forms of energy storage for renewables (like compressed air) in micro-grids settings

Re: Artificial superstrong silkworm silk surpasses natural spider silks

#35

Post by zdragnar »

geysersam wrote: post #22
dsign wrote: post #19

IMO, fibers with very high tensile strength have only two applications worth speaking of: a) Space elevators (but the tensile strength required for that is too high and we are still not close enough), and b) Large O'Neill cylinders, in the radius of about 50 kilometers (about 30 miles). With regards to tensile strength, these would require something with the strength of graphene. This particular fiber seems to have 2…

Why not things like: * Buildings * Bridges * High voltage wires with very few supports

Since it is still a protein based biopolymer, it is going to naturally decompose. Per the article, it may be doped with zinc, which is very not good in excess in water supplies. It'd need to be pretty heavily treated to make it suitable for any application where safety is a concern.

Re: Artificial superstrong silkworm silk surpasses natural spider silks

#36

Post by beefield »

netjiro wrote: post #31
beefield wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regarding ropes, for most practical applications I can think fro the top of my head, tensile strength is not actually that much of a limiting factor (especially with dyneema), but more the abrasion resistance and how easy it is to handle a rope. I mean, you could in theory rappel from something like 2mm dyneema line with very comfortable safety margin on tensile strength alone, but 1. keeping a say 60m long 2mm line…

if the load bearing core is miniscule and light you have plenty of mass and radius available for abrasion resistance, handling properties, etc ...

Yes, but we are there already in many applications where we need to pad the core for abrasion and handling. Making the core even more smaller makes no big benefit - unless it is substantially cheaper than the competition.

And to be clear, I believe there are multiple applications for higher tensile strength fibers. I just can't see that many applications where thinner ropes than current technology produces would be a game changer.

Re: Artificial superstrong silkworm silk surpasses natural spider silks

#37

Post by baxuz »

anu7df wrote: post #4

Tensile strength of 2 GPa for this silk compared to 0.4 to 0.8 GPa for steel. Really cool.. This is without including the strength to weight aspect!

I haven't found any info on the thickness of the material for those tensile strength measurements.

How does it compare to something like Dyneema?

Re: Artificial superstrong silkworm silk surpasses natural spider silks

#38

Post by denton-scratch »

thorncorona wrote: post #20
dsign wrote: post #19

IMO, fibers with very high tensile strength have only two applications worth speaking of: a) Space elevators (but the tensile strength required for that is too high and we are still not close enough), and b) Large O'Neill cylinders, in the radius of about 50 kilometers (about 30 miles). With regards to tensile strength, these would require something with the strength of graphene. This particular fiber seems to have 2…

I can think of a couple: - Durable stringy clothing items - Thinner ropes? Particularly relevant is for safety applications. - Fiber ropes are particularly advantageous when compared to steel ropes in applications that require repeated bending.

Manufacturing garottes? Like, maybe that fancy device in the movie "The Counsellor".

Re: Artificial superstrong silkworm silk surpasses natural spider silks

#39

Post by obsrvatlarge »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #30
dsign wrote: post #19

IMO, fibers with very high tensile strength have only two applications worth speaking of: a) Space elevators (but the tensile strength required for that is too high and we are still not close enough), and b) Large O'Neill cylinders, in the radius of about 50 kilometers (about 30 miles). With regards to tensile strength, these would require something with the strength of graphene. This particular fiber seems to have 2…

I’ve read an article (maybe linked here?), about the reason that building elevators have limits to how many floors they can travel. It has to do with the weight of the cables. That article posited that spider silk was a solution, but this may be better.

Might have a problem with fire resistance.

Re: Artificial superstrong silkworm silk surpasses natural spider silks

#40

Post by shellfishgene »

Blammar wrote: post #3
chatterhead wrote: post #2

This is really neat. I hope they are secretly creating a hand-based slinger for this super strong spider silk.

I want to see a braided rope made with this stuff...

There are artificial fibers that are much stronger, and you can buy rope made from them.
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