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So today, at lunch, I spent most of it enjoying a really nice pollo
asada taco... but the part of me that wasn't enjoying the taco was
wondering what I was going to write this week's cant article about.
By the time I'd finished the taco, I still didn't know what I was going to write about. Nor did I know when I got in my car. I did notice that I'd just grown a huge mole on my face, though. I mean, seriously large and hairy. It was freaky. It wasn't there yesterday. How did it get there? Oh! It moved. Yes, one of my little friends had come to visit me. How he crawled onto my face, I have no idea. But there he was. I'm sure he had a message for me. I held up my fingernail for him to crawl onto, and then held him right in front of my eye (1). "Tell them about me," he said. Fair enough... I rolled down the window and let him drop-line into the bushes by the side of the road. It was only in hindsight, as I was driving away from the taqueria, that it occured to me that he might be the spider that was building the truly impressive webbing in my rear view mirror. If so, I've stranded a very determined artiste a couple miles away from home... which wouldn't be so bad, if the artiste wasn't about as large as your average mole. That's ok, I'll make it up to him -- I'll tell you a couple neat things about my friends. For one thing, these little buggers were just the thing Curt Conners should have been looking into, rather than lizards. Unlike most creepy crawlies, when spiders molt they are able to regenerate lost limbs and other appendages. Then again, it's not like Peter would have wanted the competition. And you know those little water spiders? Everyone knows that they stay on top of the water because of the laws of surface tension. But did you know that the way they walk on water is actually a method of rowing? They push the water they displace like an oar, and then lift the leg forward to place a new dimple further ahead. Well, at least, that's how they walk. When in a lazy mood they'll lift up two or more legs and just sail down the river. In a panic they'll gallop across the water using the same slapping motion that water-walking lizards use. The more disturbing thing to note is that given the spider's frame, the surface tension trick should be able to support beasties up to a half a kilo in weight. That's one big spider doing his Jesus impression. Of course, you can't say much about spiders without talking about webs. Sure, there are some spiders who don't make webs, and more still that do odd things with their webs -- like the Bolas spiders who actually hunt their prey by making large sticky balls attached to tethers which they swing around in circles and then hurl at their next meal. And ever wonder how a spider doesn't stick to his own web? It's not any special trick with surface tension, or greasy fingers... the spider's just in the know. Only the spiral strands of an orb web are sticky, the support spokes aren't. You ever wonder what makes up most spider webs? It's protein... tasty protein. Any spider that is done using its web will usually eat it (that web is a substantial ammount of invested energy and effort on the part of the spider). If you see an abandoned web in your house, shed a tear, as it's probably the sign of a dead spider, or one that got driven off to a taqueria somewhere(2). You should also note that spider silk is a member of the same protein group as collagen, which makes up ligaments, and keratin, which makes up fingernails, feathers, horns and hoofs. Spider silk is often used to make cross-hairs for rifle sights. For this application they use the sturdy drop-line type silk, which is thought that, if collected in a pencil thick strand, could stop a 747 in flight. Sadly, it seems that you can't look up spider silk on the internet without running into Nexia and their insidious goat farm, though. Nexia is a French-Canadian company that's been creating their own breed of specialized spider-goats to mass produce high tensile spider silk for military applications. Oh, sure, they have a non-military application -- bio-degradable stitches for operations. But doesn't it strike anyone as strange that with supposedly 747 stopping strength the only non-military application is still pseudo military? Do they think the public just isn't ready for BioSteel(tm) -- the official name of their product. And what's with their new spider goat breeding facility? At the beginning of 2001 a Dr. Turner of Nexia said "You only need about 200 goats to serve the world's demands." Yet in their latest press release they announced: [Nexia] has begun construction to increase capacity at its St. Telesphore facility. Nexia's 5,000 square foot facility expansion will house approximately 250 goats and produce medical device grade protein for BioSteel(tm). The facility is planned to be consistent with the FDA's points to consider regarding transgenic animal housing facilities. (3)Why the ramp up in goat production? Well, why not? I think Nexia's military-only smokescreen is beginning to blow away. Think of how much of our clothing and other products are currently made with natural fibers. DuPont, our favorite chemicals-for-the-future company, hasn't ignored our friend the spider. They see natural and synthetic versions of spider silk as nylon. "What's particularly interesting to us is the way these organisms make silk nylons in environmentally benign ways," DuPont scientist O'Brien says. "They process proteins from water-based solutions, without using petroleum products or organic solvents. From a manufacturing point of view, this is very attractive... [Given the] consumer love affair with natural fibers ... we're aiming for a better-than-natural alternative fiber." Plant Cell Technologies is looking to insert the a whole high-tensile silk gene into soy or another high-protein plant. No waiting on the milk maid to return from the goats, they'll plant spider-beans by the acre. And why stop at crossing plants and spiders, why not work on the simple things, like the colors of the silks themselves. A Glenn Elion of Plant Cell Technologies claims that by playing god with regulatory genes that spiders use for camouflaging their silk they might be able to get other colors. "We're talking about billions of dollars ... this is a major market." "Bio-inspired materials are providing a new frontier for the fiber business," Cornell biophysicist Lynn Jelinski says. "Someone's going to hit a home run in this field. But I'm not sure yet who it will be." Still don't believe that Nexia will stop short at 250 goats? Look at the competition they already face, and then look at them drooling over their own product in their prospectus: The large scale production of recombinant proteins is via transgenic BELE goats. Our BELE (Breed Early, Lactate Early) transgenic goat system features short generation times, a multiplicity of births, lack of seasonality and good milk production. The BELE goat system permits rapid "access to the goat genome" on a cost/time effective basis. Further, Nexia has a major R&D program devoted to the development and use of goat nuclear transfer techniques as a means of improving the efficiency of gene transfer and generation of transgenic animal founders.If they've gone to such effort to make a fast webbing goat, why hold back at a mere 250? Why not many many more?
i,jasona
sources (where I stole large quotes from): |