Attachment Structures and Adhesive Secretions in Arachnids by Jonas O Wolff

Attachment Structures and Adhesive Secretions in Arachnids by Jonas O Wolff

This book surveys attachment structures and adhesive secretions occurring in this class of animals and discusses the relationships between structure, properties, and function in the context of evolutionary trends, and biomimetic potential. Topics comprise mechanical attachment devices, such as clamps, claws, hooks, spines and wraps, as well as hairy and smooth adhesive pads, nano-fibrils, suction cups, and viscid and solidifying adhesives. Attachment is one of the major types of interactions between an organism and its environment. There are numerous studies that deal with this phenomenon in lizards, frogs, insects, barnacles, mussels and echinoderms, but the second largest class of animals, the Arachnida, was highly neglected so far. The authors demonstrated that most arachnid adhesive structures are highly analogous to those of insects and vertebrates, but there are also numerous unique developments with some intriguing working principles. Because arachnid attachment organs have a very strong potential of technological ideas for the development of new materials and systems, inspirations from biology could also be interesting for a broad range of topics in materials and surface engineering.

Lars Heepe is a junior research group leader at the Department of Functional Morphology and Biomechanics at the Zoological Institute of Kiel University, Germany and guest scientist at the nanotechnology centre NanoSYD of the Mads Clausen Institute, University of Southern Denmark. He received a B.S. degree in Engineering Physics from The Jena University of Applied Sciences, Germany in 2008. In 2011 he received a M.S. in Scientific Instruments from same university. After that, he joined the Prof. Stanislav N. Gorb's group at Kiel University, where he obtained his Ph.D. in Biophysics in 2014. In 2014 he was awarded with the Best Dissertation Award of the Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, Kiel University, Germany and in 2015 he received the Fraunhofer UMSICHT Science Award as well as the best dissertation award in the category Nano Life Sciences of the research focus Kiel Nano, Surface and Interface Science. He is member of the Young Academy of the Academy of the Science and Literature Mainz (2016). His research interests include adhesion, friction and contact mechanics of biological and biologically inspired attachment systems, the development of space-, time- and force-resolved in situ tribological characterization techniques, as well development of surfaces preventing marine biofouling.

Longjian Xue is Professor of Materials in School of Power and Mechanical Engineering at Wuhan University, China. He received B.S. degree in Chemistry from Wuhan University in 2004. After that, he was recommended for the admission of Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, where he earned his Ph.D. degree in Polymer Chemistry and Physics in 2010. After his short stay in Rheinisch-Westfaelische Technische Hochschule Aachen, Germany, he worked as an Alexander-von-Humboldt Fellow with hosts of Prof. Martin Steinhart from Osnabrü¾˜¶˜¼ck University and Prof. Stanislav N. Gorb from Kiel University. He then joined Prof. Arü¾Œ–”¼nzazu del Campo's Group in Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research in Mainz, Germany. In 2015, he was awarded young 1000 talents and joined Wuhan University as Professor. His research interests include investigation of stability/instability of thin polymer films, using bottom-up methods for surface patterning, fabrication and evaluation of bio-inspired micro- and nanomaterials for varies applications. He has authored 40 papers in peer reviewed journals, and has three patents.

Stanislav Gorb is a group leader at the Zoological Institute of the University of Kiel, Germany. He received his PhD degree in zoology and entomology at the Schmalhausen Institute of Zoology of the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences in Kiev. Gorb was a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Vienna, a research assistant at University of Jena, a group leader at the Max Planck Institutes for Developmental Biology in Tü¾˜¶˜¼bingen and for Metals Research in Stuttgart. Gorb's research focuses on morphology, structure, biomechanics, physiology, and evolution of surface-related functional systems in animals and plants, as well as the development of biologically inspired technological surfaces and systems. He received the Schlossmann Award in Biology and Materials Science in 1995 and was the 1998 BioFuture Competition winner for his works on biological attachment devices as possible sources for biomimetics. He is member of the Member of Academy of the Science and Literature Mainz (2010) and of the National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina (2011). Gorb has authored five books, more than 300 papers in peer reviewed journals, and four patents.