This story has been told in thousands of Marvel comics, hundreds of cartoon series and several box-office blockbusters about Spider-Man and his exploits. Only games about the hero were created at least fifty, and most recently the premiere of the game "Spider-Man" from the studio Insomniac Games, published by Sony, which shows viewers the life of both Spider-Man and Peter Parker himself.
The Marvel Universe is based on a fantasy performance. In a fantasy world, our laws of physics do not necessarily apply, so the abilities of Spider-Man do not require scientific evidence, although they are based on science and are an exaggerated version of real scientific facts. According to the story, Peter Parker acquired his powers through the venom of an irradiated spider. They endowed him with superhuman agility and speed, reaction and strength, and over time led to the development of even more impressive abilities, including night vision and remarkable scent.
Strength of polymers
The main advantage of Spider-Man, undoubtedly, was the ability to release threads of sticky and incredibly durable spider webs. If we ignore the air resistance and consider the “shot” to be strictly vertical, then we can estimate the speed of the spider's threads: v = (2gh), that is, v = (2 * 9.8 m / s2 * 100 m) = 44 m / s, or about 160 km / h. And although this is even less than the speed of a bullet or at least a sound, the energy that is required for this cannot fail to impress. It is difficult to imagine how the body could obtain it without an additional artificial source.
But the strength of Spider-Man's threads is quite "scientific": the spider's web is one of the strongest polymers on the planet. Its tensile strength is about 1000 MPa, and in the frame thread of Araneus diadematus spiders it reaches 2700 MPa. Such an indicator is beyond the power of the best grades of high-carbon steel. Therefore, already a 3 mm Spider-Man cable (taking its strength as 1000 MPa) is able to withstand a load of more than 7000 N and cope with a load weighing up to 720 kg - or with the weight of a normal person even with strong acceleration in a fall.
Arachnids' web is secreted by specialized glands in the back of the abdomen, and the same animal may have several types of glands that create a web with different properties. But in any case, in terms of chemical composition, this is a special protein, very close to silk protein. Its chains are rich in glycine (the smallest of the amino acids, it provides flexibility to the polymer strands) and serine (the only amino acid in living organisms that contains sulfur, which is able to form additional bonds that strengthen the shape of the protein). And individual sections of the protein contain exceptionally large amounts of the third amino acid, alanine.
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It would seem, why do we need all these details? However, it is they who create the special microstructure of spider-web proteins-spidroins: alanine regions form densely packed crystalline regions, and glycine regions - amorphous, elastic bonds between them. Drying in the air, the entire structure hardens and forms a thread from which the spider weaves parts of its web. This process is difficult, but nevertheless the synthesis of the web is even more difficult. Spiders spend so many resources on the production of spidroins that they often eat old and damaged threads themselves in order to reuse them.
Alien web
Attempts to "tame" the web and get it in the laboratory, and then on an industrial scale, have not stopped for many decades. During this time, it was possible to identify and isolate the spidroin gene from spiders and transfer it to other organisms, so today it is possible to extract a protein polymer not only from specially grown silkworms or spiders, but also from E. coli bacteria, genetically modified plants of tobacco and potatoes, and even from … goat milk is animals that carry the spider protein gene. The main technical problem in this area is, in fact, the weaving of threads from this valuable resource.
Spiders use an extremely complex system of spider web glands: unlike the same milk, from nails and hair, this material needs a delicate, even jewelry synthesis process. Spidroin must be released at a strictly defined low speed and entwine at a certain moment, being in the required stage of hardening. Therefore, the glands of some spiders are extremely complex, containing several separate reservoirs for the sequential "maturation" of the web and its formation. It's hard to even imagine how Spider-Man could weave it at a speed of 150 km / h. But just to synthesize spidroin the man of the future will be quite capable.
No, nothing like genes is transmitted with bites, be it an ordinary animal or even a radioactive spider. Even the "induced" radiation itself, which could persist in the bite of a spider that survived hard radiation, is unlikely to be able to reach a serious level for us - unless its poison consisted of pure plutonium. And "mutagenic enzymes" would hardly have given Peter Parker the necessary superpowers. As far as we know, such people do not exist in nature: our body, on the contrary, is constantly fighting against random mutations, and whole protein armies are constantly busy "repairing" damaged DNA. Suppression of the work of these proteins increases the level of mutations - but in this case, Peter Parker, most likely, would simply die from one of the cancers, which are fraught with random mutations.
It is hardly possible to get the genes of spidroin proteins we need with a bite. To do this, a certain DNA fragment must not only enter the body, but also avoid the attack of the immune system, while penetrating the cell membrane, then the nuclear membrane - and, finally, integrate into the active region of some chromosome. It is hard to imagine that this happened by accident - viruses have been honing this simple skill for billions of years and countless generations. Therefore, it is viruses that can give hope that someday science will turn Parker's volunteer into something like a real Spider-Man.
Energy and nanotechnology
Indeed, in 2010, when goats were obtained that produce milk with spiderweb proteins, scientists used modified viruses to transfer genes. Unable to harm the cell, they nevertheless retained the ability to attach to it and deliver an artificial analogue of the spidroin gene inside. By the way, the polymer obtained in this way was woven into an extremely durable material, which Nexia Biotechnologies promoted under the BioSteel trademark, but the production process was never brought to an economically justified cost and scale, so today the company has gone bankrupt. But we got distracted.
The DNA fragments necessary for the synthesis of spidroin were introduced into goats at the stage of unicellular embryos. Subsequently, these genes were found in all daughter cells of the formed organism, although scientists integrated them into that part of the genome that was active only in cells engaged in the synthesis of mother's milk. If we want to turn Peter Parker into Spider-Man, it will be much harder. First, the target gene must appear in the chromosomes of an adult organism, at once in a multitude of formed cells in certain areas of the skin, and everywhere integrate into the desired area.
In theory, the latest technologies, which are now going through various stages of study and laboratory tests, can allow this, plus some ideas that remain a matter of the more distant future. In particular, the improved CRISPR / Cas method promises precise integration of genes into the desired regions of chromosomes. It uses a special set of bacterial enzymes and RNA to make cuts in a DNA strand at a specific location. The cell's own enzymes immediately rush to repair this artificial damage and use the first "patch" that comes along - usually a fragment of a gene that people need to be introduced together with the Cas proteins.
Retroviruses can provide transport for the delivery of the entire set of molecules, as has been done with goats. And nanotechnology will make it possible to equip the shells of viral particles with elements, for example, reacting to a magnetic field, in order to activate gene modification strictly in the necessary cells of the adult Peter Parker. It is more difficult to imagine how from the cells of his skin and, apparently, from the sweat and sebaceous glands, it would be possible to obtain arachnoid glands, arranged much more complexly and working differently. But metabolism remains the main problem.
Like the flight of birds, snake venom, or the brains of humans, the web is an amazingly complex adaptation, a true masterpiece of evolution that has ensured the success of a large group of animals. But the brain, and flight, and the synthesis of toxins and cobwebs are adaptations that are extremely expensive for the body. Experiments with Australian relatives of vipers have shown that after being bitten, they must increase their metabolic rate by almost 70% in order to gradually restore the supply of protein poison. How much should a person's metabolism increase in order for him to synthesize hundreds of meters of thick web rope? How much food does he need and how high in calories should it be? It seems that all of this reasoning puts an end to our dreams of a real Spider-Man.
Instead of an afterword
Even if we only want to get a person who can synthesize cobwebs little by little, adding the spidroin gene to Peter Parker will not be enough. The same remarks are true in our case. We will have to grow spider's glands in him, provide him with an increased metabolism, which will give him additional speed, agility and balance - and energy for the synthesis of the web. It is unlikely that this is possible within the framework of our body, and it is unlikely that such experiments will ever be performed. But the power of spider web polymers itself will sooner or later come to our service, and we will get a new amazing material for heavy-duty and lightweight clothing, cables, for medicine and complex optics. Perhaps, such products will not look as impressive as the fantastic Spider-Man, but they will probably save lives no less.
