Spiders produce nature’s toughest fiber using renewable components at ambient temperatures and with water as solvent, making it highly interesting to replicate for the materials industry. Despite this, much remains to be understood about the bio processing and composition of spider silk fibers. Here, we identify 18 proteins that makeup the spiders’ strongest silk type, the major ampullate fiber. Single-cell RNA sequencing and spatial transcriptomics revealed that the secretory epithelium of the gland harbors six cell types. These cell types are confined to three distinct glandular zones that produce specific combinations of silk proteins. Image analysis of histological sections showed that the secretions from the three zones do not mix, and proteomics analysis revealed that these secretions form layers in the final fiber. Using a multiomics approach, we provide substantial advancements in the understanding of the structure and function of the major ampullate silk gland as well as of the architecture and composition of the fiber it produces.
Here’s the link to the paper:
https://www.science.org/doi/epdf/10.1126/sciadv.adn0597
Nice job, which was possible only because of the great team involved (especially Sumalata):
Sumalata Sonavane, Sameer Hassan, Urmimala Chatterjee, Lucile Soler, Lena Holm, Annelie Mollbrink, Gabriele Greco, Noah Fereydouni, Olga Vinnere Pettersson, Ignas Bunikis, Allison Churcher, Henrik Lantz, Jan Johansson, Johan Reimegård, Anna Rising
