Inspired by Spider-Man, scientists recreate web-slinging technology

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Inspired by Spider-Man, Scientists Recreate Web-Slinging Technology

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Inspired by Spider-Man, Scientists Recreate Web-Slinging Technology

Ashish Gupta

Published November 24, 2025

8 Min Read

(Photo by Stem List on Unsplash)

We all have moments as kids watching Spider-Man and imagining what it might feel like to shoot a thread into the air and have it grab something, bringing it closer. A group of researchers at Tufts University has moved that idea from comic panels into the lab. Their new work shows a fluid silk material that shoots from a needle, solidifies mid-air, sticks to objects, and can lift items far heavier than itself.
The whole story began with silk, not the kind spiders spin, but the silk taken from moth cocoons, which are boiled down into their basic protein building blocks known as fibroin. The silk fibroin solution can be pushed through narrow-bore needles to make thin threads, and when exposed to solvents like ethanol or acetone, it slowly starts turning into a semi-solid hydrogel.
The problem is that this transformation usually takes hours. Spider silk hardens almost instantly as it leaves the glands, which gives spiders the precise control that engineers have struggled to match.
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Then a little accident helped make a breakthrough. “I was working on a project making extremely strong adhesives using silk fibroin, and while I was cleaning my glassware with acetone, I noticed a web-like material forming on the bottom of the glass,” said Marco Lo Presti, research assistant professor at Tufts.
It turned out that dopamine, a key component they were already using for adhesive work, dramatically sped up the solidification process. When dopamine is mixed into the solution, it appears to pull water away from the silk proteins, so the liquid fibroin doesn’t need hours to set. Instead, once it meets the organic solvent, it snaps into a fiber in just seconds.

From there, the team built a coaxial needle system where the fibroin–dopamine solution moves through the center while a layer of acetone flows around it. As the stream leaves the nozzle, the acetone triggers rapid solidification and then evaporates in mid-air, allowing the forming fiber to latch onto objects it makes contact with. What comes out is a thread that can shoot through open air, stick on contact, and hold surprising amounts of weight.
To boost performance, the team mixed fibroin–dopamine solution with chitosan, a material derived from insect exoskeletons, which increased tensile strength up to 200 times. A borate buffer made the fibers roughly eighteen times stickier. Depending on the needle bore, the resulting fiber diameter can be as thin as hair or closer to half a millimeter.

In testing, the demonstrations took on a playful look as the fibers picked up a cocoon, a steel bolt, a tube floating on water, a scalpel half-buried in sand, and even a block of wood from around 12 centimeters away. Under various conditions, the fibers can lift objects more than 80 times their own weight. For a jet of liquid silk that hardens mid-air, that lifting strength is remarkable.
Silk solution jets solidify into fibers that stick to and lift multiple steel bolts from a sand-filled petri dish. (Marco Lo Presti, Tufts University)
Spiders don’t actually shoot their silk into the air. They make contact with a surface first, attach a strand, then pull and arrange their webs with careful choreography. As Lo Presti explained, “Spiders cannot shoot their web… we are demonstrating a way to shoot a fiber from a device, then adhere to and pick up an object from a distance. Rather than presenting this work as a bio-inspired material, it’s really a superhero-inspired material.”
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Natural spider silk is still about a thousand times stronger than the man-made fiber in this study, but the method opens a path for controlled shooting, instant solidification, and strong adhesion. With further innovations, it could grow into something far more capable and find its place in many different technological applications.

“We can be inspired by nature. We can be inspired by comics and science fiction. In this case, we wanted to reverse engineer our silk material to behave the way nature originally designed it, and comic book writers imagined it,” said Fiorenzo Omenetto, Frank C. Doble Professor of Engineering at Tufts University and director of the Silklab.
This research was published in Advanced Functional Materials.

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Inspired by Spider-Man, Scientists Recreate Web-Slinging Technology

This research, spearheaded by scientists at Tufts University, represents a significant advancement in materials science, drawing inspiration from the fictional abilities of Spider-Man. The project’s core objective was to develop a system capable of shooting and solidifying a silk-like material mid-air, allowing it to adhere to objects and lifting items far exceeding its own weight. The initial breakthrough stemmed from an accidental observation by research assistant professor Marco Lo Presti, who noticed the rapid solidification of a silk fibroin solution when exposed to acetone – a solvent originally used for cleaning glassware. This unexpected event revealed that the addition of dopamine dramatically accelerated the hardening process, mimicking the near-instantaneous solidification observed in spider silk glands.

The team then engineered a coaxial needle system, meticulously controlling the flow of the dopamine-infused silk fibroin solution and acetone. This precise mechanism allowed the material to rapidly solidify upon exiting the nozzle, creating a fiber that could latch onto objects in mid-air. Further enhancements incorporated chitosan, derived from insect exoskeletons, to boost tensile strength by a remarkable 200 times, combined with a borate buffer to increase stickiness by roughly 18 times. The ability to tailor the fiber diameter, ranging from hair-thin to approximately half a millimeter, showcased the versatility of the system.

In demonstrations, the researchers showcased the technology's capabilities with impressive results, manipulating the fibers to capture a cocoon, a steel bolt, a floating tube, a scalpel buried in sand, and a wooden block placed approximately 12 centimeters away. Notably, the fibers were capable of lifting objects multiple times their own weight – exceeding 80 times – pointing to the immense potential of the technology. Fiorenzo Omenetto, the Frank C. Doble Professor of Engineering at Tufts University, emphasized that despite the current advancements, natural spider silk remains approximately one thousand times stronger, highlighting the next steps for refining the material.

This project isn't simply a bio-inspired material; it’s a “superhero-inspired” creation, according to Omenetto. The team’s efforts successfully combined scientific principles with a fascination for iconic comic book design, developing a system for controlled silk projection, instant solidification, and robust adhesion. Further development in this area promises a wide array of technological applications, stemming from the fundamental understanding of how nature designed its most amazing material.