Posted on 07/15/2005 10:10:23 PM PDT by neverdem
Animal weaves strong glass
For tips on building sturdy skyscrapers and bridges, you could consult engineering textbooks.
Or you could plumb the frigid depths of the western Pacific.
There, a not-so-humble sponge called Euplectella has been demonstrating fundamental principles of engineering since long before the dawn of skyscrapers, bridges or engineers.
Euplectella weaves an intricate skeleton of glass.
If you are a shrimp living inside this glass house, you can throw all the stones you want. This latticework is built to last, scientists from Lucent Technologies' Bell Labs report in today's issue of Science.
"What is fascinating is that nature takes inherently poor materials -- glass is brittle, it breaks -- and turns it into a very strong structure," Joanna Aizenberg, lead author of the scientific paper, said in an interview.
This research could suggest ways to make cheaper and stronger fiber optics for telecommunications, Aizenberg said.
Engineers need expensive high heat to make glass ... that breaks. Euplectella converts silica from seawater into strong glass at near-freezing temperatures.
What's more, the sponge works its magic at an incredibly tiny scale -- some elements of its skeleton are more than a thousand times slimmer than a human hair. Engineers in the emerging field of nanotechnology are striving to emulate such feats of miniaturization to forge lighter and tougher materials.
Euplectella is dubbed the Venus flower basket because its hollow glass cage attracts mating shrimp. The shrimp get a safe home, and the sponge gets their leftovers.
Aizenberg, 45, also has studied the brittlestar, a starfish that "sees" with its skeleton. The Moscow native spotted a Venus flower basket in a shell shop near San Francisco a few years ago and was enthralled.
The glass basket derives its strength from multiple reinforcements, similar to strategies used in modern construction.
(Excerpt) Read more at nj.com ...
I took a robotics course in college that modeled robot structures, materials, and controls off of the attributes of plants and animals: Organism and Robot. It was the best engineering course in my entire four years.
BTTT
Why not just throw the plans for the undersea intercontinental cable Global Crossing was going to build and let the sponges do it? One caution - don't let them unionize.
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Some folks were added to the health and science ping list because of their interest in stem cells and the last link in this comment. I don't post stories about health and medicine anymore. I just link them to threads or the original websites. Feel free to post them if you want to post them on FR.
Re: I don't post stories about health and medicine anymore.
Too bad.
So, then you aren't pinging with links to unrelated topics, I assume. Do you encourage comment on the other links on this thread?
Mantin, you beat me to it!
I'm not sure what you mean. I'm pinging under science.
Do you encourage comment on the other links on this thread?
Comment as you please. I'm not the FEC or McCain.
Nor, am I an inscrutable admin mod.
I studied and worked as a chemist before I did the same as a physician. Please, do as you please. It seems the admin mods have a wild hair about me.
Not surprised the engineering course was uncommonly valuable.
God's handiwork has profound clues about lots of things.
jbstrick, you beat me to saying "Martin, you beat me to it!"
Spongeworthy ?
Oh darn, you beat me to it. (Photo of Sponge Bob)LOL.
I find it really hard to believe that all God's creatures, who seem perfectly "designed" for their environments, got to be the way they are by accident.
Eendthematrix has a good point. There's an easy solution. Post the article on FR and make a comment# 1. You can ping me. If I have anything more to contribute, I will do so. If not, thanks for the ping! I would look foolish posting stories about health and medicine at this point. Posting health and medicine stories at FR is too tricky for me. Mad cow disease, HIV/AIDS and New York Medicaid Fraud May Reach Into Billions stories can be breaking news or front page stories, but other equally important stories are not. Go figure.
Thanks for the ping.
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