Spiderman was
a fictional character inspired for the medical world, especially for patients
with burns and broken bones. Medical miracle that combines human skin and
spider silk (fabric spider web) and even one day can make a bullet proof skin.
Dutch artist
Jalila Essaidi and cell biologists Abdoelwaheb El Ghalbzouri mixing synthetic
spider silk with human skin to produce super-strong materials that can stop a
rifle bullet shot at half the regular rate.
El Ghalbzouri
and Essaidi saw the potential for more mixing between human skin and the silk
is when they develop skin grafts for burn patients.
"Skin
(mixing of human skin and spider silk) is much stronger and tougher than
regular skin," explains El Ghalbzour, as reported by the Telegraph on
Wednesday (09/14/2011).
Some research
suggests that regular use of silk can encourage faster healing of burns and
reduce scarring. Now, El Ghalbzouri wanted to see if combining the spider silk
in the treatment of burns have the same result.
"Next to
the skin, spider silk could be an excellent scaffold for regeneration of bone,
cartilage, tendons, ligaments," he said.
El Ghalbzouri
said that the spider silk three times stronger than Kevlar (aramid synthetic
fiber) used for bulletproof vests worn by the military draft and the people in
conflict areas.
"Because
of bulletproof vest made of 33 layers of Kevlar, using layers of spider silk
could prove more effective in stopping bullets," said El Ghalbzouri.
But he said
more research is needed to make the skin grafts were completely bulletproof.
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