August 15, 2011
Dutch Scientist Wants To Make Human Skin Bulletproof With Help From Spider-Goats.

From The Daily What: Geek:

Spider-Goats of the Day

Spider-Goats of the Day: Dutch scientist Jalila Essaïdi wants to make human skin as strong as a bulletproof vest, and her method involves placing a spider-silk matrix between two layers of tissue.

Unfortunately — or fortunately, if you’re arachnophobic — spiders don’t make enough silk fast enough for the project to succeed. So Essaidi is bypassing spiders altogether and using genetically-modified goats instead.

The “spider goats” produce a silk protein that comes out in their milk, allowing scientists to harvest enough to test the bulletproof skin theory. The project looks promising, although it doesn’t yet stop bullets 100% of the time.

Essaïdi’s next goal is to replace keratin in the human body with spider silk, making our entire bodies bulletproof. Why didn’t Peter Parker think of that?

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