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Spider webs

Damage control

Nature Materials volume 11, pages 273–274 (2012)Cite this article

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A study reveals that spider orb webs fail in a nonlinear fashion, owing to the hierarchical organization of the silk proteins. The discovery may serve as inspiration for engineers for the design of aerial, light-weight, robust architectures.

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Figure 1: Species-specific mechanical behaviour of silk fibres under tensile loading.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Fiorenzo G. Omenetto and David L. Kaplan are in the Department of Biomedical Engineering of Tufts University, Medford, Massachusetts 02155, USA,

    Fiorenzo G. Omenetto & David L. Kaplan

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  1. Fiorenzo G. Omenetto
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  2. David L. Kaplan
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Correspondence to Fiorenzo G. Omenetto or David L. Kaplan.

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Omenetto, F., Kaplan, D. Damage control. Nature Mater 11, 273–274 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat3291

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