Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Letter
  • Published:

Directional water collection on wetted spider silk

Nature volume 463, pages 640–643 (2010)Cite this article

Subjects

Abstract

Many biological surfaces in both the plant and animal kingdom possess unusual structural features at the micro- and nanometre-scale that control their interaction with water and hence wettability1,2,3,4,5. An intriguing example is provided by desert beetles, which use micrometre-sized patterns of hydrophobic and hydrophilic regions on their backs to capture water from humid air6. As anyone who has admired spider webs adorned with dew drops will appreciate, spider silk is also capable of efficiently collecting water from air. Here we show that the water-collecting ability of the capture silk of the cribellate spider Uloborus walckenaerius is the result of a unique fibre structure that forms after wetting, with the ‘wet-rebuilt’ fibres characterized by periodic spindle-knots made of random nanofibrils and separated by joints made of aligned nanofibrils. These structural features result in a surface energy gradient between the spindle-knots and the joints and also in a difference in Laplace pressure, with both factors acting together to achieve continuous condensation and directional collection of water drops around spindle-knots. Submillimetre-sized liquid drops have been driven by surface energy gradients7,8,9 or a difference in Laplace pressure10, but until now neither force on its own has been used to overcome the larger hysteresis effects that make the movement of micrometre-sized drops more difficult. By tapping into both driving forces, spider silk achieves this task. Inspired by this finding, we designed artificial fibres that mimic the structural features of silk and exhibit its directional water-collecting ability.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: Structures of dry capture silk of cribellate spider.
Figure 2: In situ optical microscopic observation of directional water collection on spider silk in mist.
Figure 3: Structure of wet-rebuilt spider silk.
Figure 4: Mechanism of directional water collection on wet-rebuilt spider silk.
Figure 5: Artificial spider silk that mimics the structure and water collection capability of natural spider silk.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Feng, L. et al. Super-hydrophobic surfaces: from natural to artificial. Adv. Mater. 14, 1857–1860 (2002)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Gao, X. F. & Jiang, L. Water-repellent legs of water striders. Nature 432, 36 (2004)

    Article  CAS  ADS  Google Scholar 

  3. Blossey, R. Self-cleaning surfaces—virtual realities. Nature Mater. 2, 301–306 (2003)

    Article  CAS  ADS  Google Scholar 

  4. Sun, T. L., Feng, L., Gao, X. F. & Jiang, L. Bioinspired surfaces with special wettability. Acc. Chem. Res. 38, 644–652 (2005)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Li, X. M., Reinhoudt, D. & Crego-Calama, M. What do we need for a superhydrophobic surface? A review on the recent progress in the preparation of superhydrophobic surfaces. Chem. Soc. Rev. 36, 1350–1368 (2007)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Parker, A. R. & Lawrence, C. R. Water capture by a desert beetle. Nature 414, 33–34 (2001)

    Article  CAS  ADS  Google Scholar 

  7. Chaudhury, M. K. & Whitesides, G. M. How to make water run uphill. Science 256, 1539–1541 (1992)

    Article  CAS  ADS  Google Scholar 

  8. Daniel, S., Chaudhury, M. K. & Chen, J. C. Fast drop movements resulting from the phase change on a gradient surface. Science 291, 633–636 (2001)

    Article  CAS  ADS  Google Scholar 

  9. Daniel, S., Sircar, S., Gliem, J. & Chaudhury, M. K. Ratcheting motion of liquid drops on gradient surfaces. Langmuir 20, 4085–4092 (2004)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. Lorenceau, É. & Quéré, D. Drops on a conical wire. J. Fluid Mech. 510, 29–45 (2004)

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  11. Vollrath, F. & Porter, D. Spider silk as archetypal protein elastomer. Soft Matter 2, 377–385 (2006)

    Article  CAS  ADS  Google Scholar 

  12. Vollrath, F. et al. Compounds in the droplets of the orb spider’s viscid spiral. Nature 345, 526–528 (1990)

    Article  CAS  ADS  Google Scholar 

  13. Liu, Y., Shao, Z. & Vollrath, F. Relationships between supercontraction and mechanical properties of spider silk. Nature Mater. 4, 901–905 (2005)

    Article  CAS  ADS  Google Scholar 

  14. Vollrath, F. Strength and structure of spiders’ silks. Rev. Mol. Biotechnol. 74, 67–83 (2000)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  15. Vollrath, F. & Edmonds, D. T. Modulation of the mechanical properties of spider silk by coating with water. Nature 340, 305–307 (1989)

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  16. Edmonds, D. T. & Vollrath, F. The contribution of atmospheric water vapour to the formation and efficiency of a spider’s capture web. Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B 248, 145–148 (1992)

    Article  CAS  ADS  Google Scholar 

  17. Backer, N. et al. Molecular nanosprings in spider capture-silk threads. Nature Mater. 2, 278–283 (2003)

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  18. Peter, H. M. The spinning apparatus of Uloboridae in relation to the structure and construxtion of capture threads (Arachnida, Araneida). Zoomorphology 104, 96–104 (1984)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  19. Porter, D. & Vollrath, F. Nanoscale toughness of spider silk. Nanotoday 2, 6 (2007)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Emile, O., Floch, A. L. & Vollrath, F. Biopolymers: shape memory in spider draglines. Nature 440, 621 (2006)

    Article  CAS  ADS  Google Scholar 

  21. Yang, J., Yang, Z., Chen, C. & Yao, D. Conversion of surface energy and manipulation of a single droplet across micropatterned surfaces. Langmuir 24, 9889–9897 (2008)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  22. Fang, G., Li, W., Wang, X. & Qiao, G. Droplet motion on designed microtextured superhydrophobic surfaces with tunable wettability. Langmuir 24, 11651–11660 (2008)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  23. Wenzel, R. N. Resistance of solid surface to wetting by water. Ind. Eng. Chem. 28, 988–994 (1936)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  24. Quéré, D. Wetting and roughness. Annu. Rev. Mater. Res. 38, 16.1–16.29 (2008)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  25. Zheng, Y. M., Gao, X. F. & Jiang, L. Directional adhesion of superhydrophobic butterfly wings. Soft Matter 3, 178–182 (2007)

    Article  CAS  ADS  Google Scholar 

  26. Gau, H., Herminghaus, S., Lenz, P. & Lipowsky, R. Liquid morphologies on structured surfaces: from microchannels to microchips. Science 283, 46–49 (1999)

    Article  CAS  ADS  Google Scholar 

  27. Yoshimitsu, Z., Nakajima, A., Watanabe, T. & Hashimoto, K. Effects of surface structure on the hydrophobicity and sliding behavior of water droplets. Langmuir 18, 5818–5822 (2002)

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

We thank the State Basic Research Program of China (2007CB936403), the Key Program in the National Natural Science Foundation of China (119030601101), and the Knowledge Innovation Program in the Chinese Academy of Sciences (2A200522222200301).

Author Contributions Y. Zheng, H.B., Z.H. and X.T. performed the experiments. Y. Zheng and Z.H. worked on the water collection of natural spider silks, H.B. and X.T. worked on the fabrication and water collection of artificial spider silk. Y. Zheng and H.B. conducted the control experiments. Y. Zheng, H.B., Y. Zhao and L.J. collected and analysed the data and proposed the mechanism of directional water collection on spider silk. Y. Zheng, F.-Q.N., Y. Zhao., J.Z. and L.J. wrote the text. L.J. conceived the project and designed the experiments.

Author information

Author notes

  1. Yongmei Zheng and Hao Bai: These authors contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Chemistry and Environment, Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Beijing 100191, China

    Yongmei Zheng & Jin Zhai

  2. National Center for Nanoscience and Technology, Beijing 100190, China

    Hao Bai

  3. Beijing National Laboratory for Molecular Sciences (BNLMS), Institute of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China

    Zhongbing Huang, Xuelin Tian, Fu-Qiang Nie, Yong Zhao & Lei Jiang

Authors
  1. Yongmei Zheng
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Hao Bai
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Zhongbing Huang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Xuelin Tian
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Fu-Qiang Nie
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. Yong Zhao
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  7. Jin Zhai
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  8. Lei Jiang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Yong Zhao or Lei Jiang.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

This file contains Supplementary Methods, Supplementary Figures S1-S8 with Legends, a Supplementary Discussion and Supplementary References. (PDF 1593 kb)

Supplementary Movie 1

This movie shows the in-situ observation of directional water collection on the capture silk of a cribellate spider. Note that the condensing drops move quickly from the joint to the spindle-knot of spider silk. (MOV 390 kb)

PowerPoint slides

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Zheng, Y., Bai, H., Huang, Z. et al. Directional water collection on wetted spider silk. Nature 463, 640–643 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature08729

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nature08729

This article is cited by

Comments

By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms and Community Guidelines. If you find something abusive or that does not comply with our terms or guidelines please flag it as inappropriate.

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing