STUDIES ON STRUCTURE AND PROPERTIES OF NEPHILA-SPIDER SILK DRAGLINE

Abstract

Spider dragline silk is an extremely strong biopolymer and has unique combination of desirable mechanical properties. In the present paper dragline of Golden Nephila spider was studied for dimensional, structural, physical and tensile properties. The test results established significant variability in diameter and denier of dragline filaments. The filaments possessed nearly circular cross-section and were found to be sensitive to moisture. The draglines exhibited super contraction in water. It has high strength and large elongation to break (45.9 cN/tex and 38.7 %, respectively). X-ray crystallinity of 17.5 % was obtained. The fibres were also subjected to thermo- mechanical and dynamic mechanical analysis.