Variation of Mechanical Properties with Amino Acid Content in the Silk of Nephila clavipes

Zax, David B.; Armanios, Daniel Erian; Horak, Sally; Brodowski, Chris; Yang, Zhitong

doi:10.1021/bm8001182

Cited by 6 publications

(16 citation statements)

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“…Future experiments should thus aim to decouple vibrations from prey handling to fully understand the roles of each type of stimulus on silk expression. Nutrients in prey are often used and expressed by spiders in silk; however, there is often disagreement between prey nutrient composition and the nutrient investment of the resultant silk (Craig, 2003;Zax et al, 2004). For example, depriving N. clavipes of alanine and glycine does not affect the amino acid composition of their MA silk (Zax et al, 2004).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Nutrients in prey are often used and expressed by spiders in silk; however, there is often disagreement between prey nutrient composition and the nutrient investment of the resultant silk (Craig, 2003;Zax et al, 2004). For example, depriving N. clavipes of alanine and glycine does not affect the amino acid composition of their MA silk (Zax et al, 2004). The amino acids ingested are thus not utilized directly to produce particular types of silk.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…differs between spiders feeding on crickets and those feeding on flies (Craig et al, 2000;Tso et al, 2005;Tso et al, 2007). The elicited changes in silk amino acids, nonetheless, are generally incongruent with the amino acid composition of the different prey (Craig et al, 2000;Zax et al, 2004;Guehrs et al, 2008). Therefore, the amino acid composition of the silk is unlikely to be a result of direct assimilation of the ingested materials into silk.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Rather, the silk composition is a product of gene expression (Hayashi et al, 1999;Craig, 2003). Amino acid compositional changes, additionally, do not always coincide with changes in silk mechanical properties (Madsen et al, 1999;Zax et al, 2004;Tso et al, 2007;Liao et al, 2009). Alterations in lumen hydration, pH, ions or temperature alone during spinning can exert influences over the mechanical properties of MA silk (Madsen et al, 1999;Vollrath, 2000;Dicko et al, 2004).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The web and silk properties of orb web spiders feeding on prey of different protein content may vary (Zax et al, 2004;Blamires et al, 2009;Mayntz et al, 2009), suggesting that prey nutrients, especially protein, are important in inducing changes in silk gene expression. The precise role of nutrients in web and silk properties are, nonetheless, uncertain, as other influences -such as prey size, allelochemicals, vibratory stimuli and prey handlingconfound the influence of prey nutrients (Nentwig, 1987).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Prey type, vibrations and handling interactively influence spider silk expression

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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confidence: 99%

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Silks have been proposed as potential scaffold materials for tissue engineering, mainly because of their physical properties. They are stable at physiological temperatures, flexible and resist tensile and compressive forces. Bombyx mori (silkworm) cocoon silk has been used as a suture material for over a century, and has proved to be biocompatible once the immunogenic sericin coating is removed. Spider silks have a similar structure to silkworm silk but do not have a sericin coating. This paper provides a general overview on the use of silk protein in biomaterials, with a focus on skeletal tissue engineering.

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Spiders actively choose and feed on nutritious non-prey food resources

et al. 2019

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Spiders are generalist predators adapted to consume a wide range of prey although their ability to exploit nonprey foods such as pollen, nectar, and honeydew has been referred but less studied. In this work, we investigated the effect of different non-prey food items (Glucose at 0.5 M; aphid honeydew; black scale honeydew; a mixture of glucose 0.5 M, phenylalanine 0.1 mM, proline 0.1 mM, and tryptophan 0.1 mM; honey at 10%, and pollen at 10%) on the survival of immature spiders of two functional groups represented by Haplodrassus rufipes (ground hunters) and Synema globosum (ambushers), and their feeding choices, in laboratory experiments. The overall survival of both species fed on non-prey foods significantly increased compared to individuals fed on water. The black-scale honeydew was the best food for H. rufipes increasing longevity up to 117 days. The highest survival reached by S. globosum was observed when fed on a mixture of glucose 0.5 M and three amino acids. When different non-prey food items were offered together, the exploring rate was significantly higher for H. rufipes than for S. globosum. H. rufipes chose to feed on honey whereas S. globosum chose the mixture treatment. The most chosen food items corresponded with those that provided the highest longevities in both species. Our results suggest that spiders could search, recognize and actively select the most beneficial non-prey food. Habitat management practices such as maintaining weed strips in the crop may provide these valuable supplementary food resources within agroecosystems contributing for biological pest control.

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Variation of Mechanical Properties with Amino Acid Content in the Silk of Nephila clavipes

Cited by 6 publications

References 0 publications

Prey type, vibrations and handling interactively influence spider silk expression

Prey type, vibrations and handling interactively influence spider silk expression

Skeletal tissue engineering using silk biomaterials

Spiders actively choose and feed on nutritious non-prey food resources

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