| | The Tangled Webs They Weave |
 | | It's these and other properties unique to dragline silk -- the type of silk that spiders use to make the 'spokes' of their webs -- that makes it an ideal substance from which to make a host of lighter, stronger materials that are also tougher and have more stretch. |
 | | Extracting the silk from the spiders was difficult since spiders spin their webs using a protein substance that they produce in liquid form which then changes into a solid, a process that is still a bit of a mystery to scientists. |
 | | So, it's not surprising that the scientific name for spiders, "arachnid," comes from a Greek myth about Arachne, the girl whose weaving was so beautiful it drew the wrath of goddess Athena, who turned her into (of course) a spider. |
| www.technologyreview.com /articles/05/02/wo/wo_hoffman022105.asp?trk=top (701 words) |