Spider silk has been used in medical settings for millennia – going back to the Ancient Greeks and Romans who applied cobwebs directly to wounds (1). References to spider silk are dotted throughout history and even make an appearance in Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream, “I shall desire you of more acquaintance, good Master Cobweb… If I cut my finger, I shall make bold of you.” Scientists have known for some time that some spider silks have antibiotic properties, along with remarkable ductility and tensile strength – comparable with that of high-grade alloy steel.

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BM Godfrey, “Traditional and modern biomaterials science uses of spider webs”, (2016). Available at: bit.ly/2iFai6P. Last accessed January 11, 2017. D Harvey et al., “Antibiotic spider silk: site-specific functionalization of recombinant spider silk using ‘click’ chemistry”, Adv Mater (2016). PMID: 28028885. M Andersson et al., “Biomimetic spinning of artificial spider silk from a chimeric minispidroin”, Nat Chem Bio, 2269, (2017).

About the Author

James Strachan

Over the course of my Biomedical Sciences degree it dawned on me that my goal of becoming a scientist didn’t quite mesh with my lack of affinity for lab work. Thinking on my decision to pursue biology rather than English at age 15 – despite an aptitude for the latter – I realized that science writing was a way to combine what I loved with what I was good at.



From there I set out to gather as much freelancing experience as I could, spending 2 years developing scientific content for International Innovation, before completing an MSc in Science Communication. After gaining invaluable experience in supporting the communications efforts of CERN and IN-PART, I joined Texere – where I am focused on producing consistently engaging, cutting-edge and innovative content for our specialist audiences around the world.