Inorganic component imaging of aggregate glue droplets on spider orb webs by TOF-SIMS

TL;DR

This paper reviews the application of TOF-SIMS technology to analyze the inorganic components of spider web glue droplets, revealing element distribution patterns and water content, with implications for understanding web adhesion.

Contribution

It demonstrates the use of TOF-SIMS for detailed inorganic component imaging of spider web glue, including element distribution and water content analysis.

Findings

Uniform element distribution in pristine droplets

Differential spreading in attached droplets

Water distribution correlates with salt oozing

Abstract

In this review, we discuss the use of time-of-flight secondary-ion mass spectrometry (TOF-SIMS) technology for analyzing the viscous glue (is called aggregate glue droplets) of spider orb webs and examine the results obtained. Element distribution images of the aggregate glue droplets were observed by TOF-SIMS. A uniform element distribution is seen for suspended pristine aggregate glue droplets, and a differential spreading of aggregate glue components is seen for attached aggregate glue droplets. We also observed TOF-SIMS images of water in aggregate glue droplets, where water was observed to be consistent with the distribution of oozing salt. We also found that the alkali metal in the aggregate glue droplets showed similar characteristics by feeding cesium carbonate to spiders.