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Spider silk is a protein fibre or silk spun by spiders. Spiders use silk to make webs or other structures that function as adhesive traps to catch prey, to entangle and restrain prey before biting, to transmit tactile information, or as nests or cocoons to protect their offspring.
Many spiders use especially fine silk called gossamer [13] to lift themselves off a surface, and silk also may be used by a windblown spider to anchor itself to stop its journey. [8] The term "gossamer" is used metaphorically for any exceedingly fine thread or fabric. Biologists also apply the term "balloon silk" to the threads that ...
Spider web strands have been used for crosshairs or reticles in telescopes. [28] Development of technologies to mass-produce spider silk has led to the manufacturing of prototype military protection, wound dressings and other medical devices, and consumer goods. [29] [30] [31] Spider webs can be used as a single step catalyst to make ...
The web of a funnel-web spider Tegenaria duellica. Many spiders, but not all, build webs. Other spiders use a wide variety of methods to capture prey. Web: There are several recognised types of spider web. Spiral orb webs, associated primarily with the family Araneidae; Tangle webs or cobwebs, associated with the family Theridiidae; Funnel webs,
The cephalothorax and abdomen are joined by a small, cylindrical pedicel, which allows the abdomen to move while spinning silk. [8]: 571-574 While most jumping spiders do not build webs to catch prey, they use silk for other purposes, [9] including molting and laying eggs. [10]: 495
The species belongs to a group of large spiders known as golden orb-web weavers, according to the University of Georgia, which make "enormous, multi-layered webs of gold-colored silk." They can ...
A spinneret is a silk-spinning organ of a spider or the larva of an insect. Some adult insects also have spinnerets, such as those borne on the forelegs of Embioptera. [1] Spinnerets are usually on the underside of a spider's opisthosoma, and are typically segmented. [2] [3] While most spiders have six spinnerets, some have two, four, or eight. [4]
The cribellate spiders were the first spiders to build specialized prey-catching webs, later evolving into groups that used the spinnerets solely to make webs, instead using silk threads dotted with droplets of a sticky liquid (like pearls on a necklace) to capture small arthropods, and a few large species even small bats and birds.