spiders

There have been numerous studies on spider silk and silk characteristics as well as their
applications towards creating new technology. Spider silk is extremely thin, the largest silk fibers
being only 5-10 μm. Some can be as thin as only 50 nm, making spider silk very difficult to
measure. Although spider webs are very thin and flexible, they are remarkably strong. The
tensile strength of spider webs is comparable to steel, with strength as high as 1.75 GPa. (5)
Due to the small size of spider silk, there have been few studies on how its properties
can be exploited, and even replicated. A common tool used to measure spider silk is using a
microscope. In an experiment done by researchers at UCLA (1), light microscopy was used to
compare spider silk from different species. In this study, spider silk was stretched out on a
microscope slide. The silk was then measured using a micrometer to obtain its diameter. This
method was used in several different studies to measure the diameter of spider silk in different
conditions, allowing for researchers to compare each silk effectively.​