| About this Abstract |
| Meeting |
2025 TMS Annual Meeting & Exhibition
|
| Symposium
|
Bio-Nano Interfaces and Engineering Applications
|
| Presentation Title |
The Strength and Toughness of Spider Silk Nanofibrils: Origin of the Outstanding Performance of One of the Most Impressive Biogenic Structural Materials |
| Author(s) |
Hannes C. Schniepp |
| On-Site Speaker (Planned) |
Hannes C. Schniepp |
| Abstract Scope |
Spider silk features outstanding mechanical properties, is all-protein, and hierarchically structured. It is well-understood at the length scale of the entire web and its micron-sized fibers. Its structure is also well-studied at the smallest length scales: the primary sequence of its constituting protein. However, less is known for intermediate, mesoscopic length scales. We recently discovered that spider silks entirely consist of weakly bonded nanofibrils, meaning that its traits are already present in the nanofibrills. Here we report the first mechanical characterization of individual nanofibrils, close in size to their protein secondary structures, which we recently determined. Our work finally bridges a gap to obtain a complete understanding of the mechanical properties of spider silk, from the protein sequence all the way to the entire spider web. Our work showed that the nanofibrils feature an even greater extensibility than the micron-sized spider silk fibers, with many implications for other nanofibrillar materials. |
| Proceedings Inclusion? |
Planned: |
| Keywords |
Biomaterials, Mechanical Properties, |