I did it!

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Finally, I caught my pet golden gecko Midas before he ate his skin like he does after shedding. More specifically I got an intact toe section of skin with the lamellae on it. I'm in the Biology lab right now and just focused in on the setae at 100X magnification. When I first saw them I had what might be like the elation a scientist has when they discover something new, not sure though not being a scientist. Amazing how exiting thousands of microscopic hairs can be.:) I can't see the much smaller spatulae (http://polypedal.berkeley.edu/ib32/Lectures/climb1folder/sld017.htm) though. They are impossible to see using optical microscopes.

Yay! Maybe I can post photos in a few weeks if I can find a way to post pictures from the microscope we have with a digital camera attached.

[TillEulenspiegel]

Grats!
Doesn't the Gecko use a Quantum mechanism to achieve it's adhesion to smooth surfaces?

[Dilb]

It's based on Van der Walls forces, and I wouldn't really call it quantum, it's based on unever charge distributions in neutral atoms when they get close together. More simpley, you don't need to imagine quantized levels of electron orbitals to imagine Van der Walls forces, though I imagine to get the math right you need to understand how electron clouds change in electric fields.

But it is at the atomic level if that's what you mean, as opposed to some macroscopic effect like suction cups.

Edit- thinking it over, I should point out by "neutral atom" I should say atoms which arn't in chemical bonds which are highly polar. So Van der Walls forces are what keeps nobel gasses from being ideal gases, and I think they're important in organic compounds where there are a lot of geometrically neutral molecules.

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Yeah, read about it here (http://www.lclark.edu/~autumn/dept/) the link has a link to the National Academy of Sciences paper on the discovery.

[Ohmer]

Grrr. You beat me to linking to my own webserver. It's not really mine. I'm one of its administrators. I still think of it as mine.

I've talked to Kellar about this stuff in person. The idea of a dry, self cleaning, reusable adheasive it pretty amazing.

Once again evolution solves a problem that human engineers could not.

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Originally posted by Ohmer
Once again evolution solves a problem that human engineers could not.

Well we would have if we had millions of years trying. This is one of the reasons rainforest(and all other ecologies) being destroyed makes me sigh. We don't know what we're losing. We might have already destroyed an easy cure for all types of cancer several times over already. What if that orchid that is no more since yesterday had a new type of chemical that would make a great catalyst for a type of two part glue? Or a billion other things....

[geni]

Originally posted by SkepticJ
We might have already destroyed an easy cure for all types of cancer several times over already.

Nah cancer it too varried for that.

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Originally posted by geni
Nah cancer it too varried for that.

Maybe not. Sharks can fight off all types of cancer can't they? Do hydra die of cancer? How do they do it?

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Originally posted by Ohmer
Grrr. You beat me to linking to my own webserver. It's not really mine. I'm one of its administrators. I still think of it as mine.

I've talked to Kellar about this stuff in person. The idea of a dry, self cleaning, reusable adheasive it pretty amazing.

Once again evolution solves a problem that human engineers could not.

So since you seem to be a bit more on the inside than me do you have an educated guess as to how long until I can go to the hardware store and buy a roll of Use Again tape made from nylon fiber weave with a silicone rubber coating on the outside; one side being of silicone setae? And gloves and boots for rock climbing. I love climbing. How long must I wait?[rocking back and forth in a creaky chair and whistling impatiently]

[geni]

Originally posted by SkepticJ
Maybe not. Sharks can fight off all types of cancer can't they?

Sharks can and do get cancer. The no cancer thing is a myth perpetuated by some alt med groups.

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Ah. I heard about it on National Geographic. They really have decended into woo haven't they? Sad. I'm going to have to take everything they say with a grain of salt now. I haven't heard about hydras from anyone though. Do they get cancer? They are something like 90% stem cells IIRC, cancer is very like stem cells except cancer doesn't stay put. But there haven't been any hydras kept alive for 50+ years yet. But from some research on them I've seen they might be immortal because they can repair basically any if not all damage that happens to them; that is if NG wasn't woo here to. The ones they had on there had been living for 2, or maybe it was 5 years. This is much longer than they do in the wild because stuff eats them I guess; don't get a chance to live forever. Nothing eats you when you're in your own little tank in a lab. Any hoo enough derailing for me.

[Correa Neto]

And I can´t convince my wife to allow me having an iguanna as a pet:( ...

Not even a gecko...:(

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Originally posted by Correa Neto
And I can´t convince my wife to allow me having an iguanna as a pet:( ...

Not even a gecko...:(

Why not? Tell her you're getting one or you'll buy a fossa.:D

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Originally posted by SkepticJ
So since you seem to be a bit more on the inside than me do you have an educated guess as to how long until I can go to the hardware store and buy a roll of Use Again tape made from nylon fiber weave with a silicone rubber coating on the outside; one side being of silicone setae? And gloves and boots for rock climbing. I love climbing. How long must I wait?[rocking back and forth in a creaky chair and whistling impatiently]

Please.:(


I'll try to get the photo up on Thursday.

[Suezoled]

Originally posted by geni
Sharks can and do get cancer. The no cancer thing is a myth perpetuated by some alt med groups.

Nor was taking Shark Cartilage as a cancer patient shown to be any more effective than bovine cartilage. Which is to say: not at all.

[Dilb]

Originally posted by SkepticJ
Please.:(


I'll try to get the photo up on Thursday.

If you'd settle for an uninformed opinion, they figured out how to make it (or at least a pretty good approximation) a few years ago, but the process was so expensive that they didn't want to make a single glove for someone to wear. So I'd guess between 5 and 20 years, depending on whether it's possible to make it cheaply.
I probably read this article (http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?chanID=sa003&articleID=000C1ED0-F88B-1EDC-8E1C809EC588EF21). So if you're fabulously rich, there doesn't seem to be any immediate barrier to making a glove, besides maybe having to buy out a particular scientist or two.

Hey, it's beating that whole "artificial spider silk from goats" project, at least. They've been GMing things for over a decade to try and make that stuff.

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Originally posted by Dilb
If you'd settle for an uninformed opinion, they figured out how to make it (or at least a pretty good approximation) a few years ago, but the process was so expensive that they didn't want to make a single glove for someone to wear. So I'd guess between 5 and 20 years, depending on whether it's possible to make it cheaply.
I probably read this article (http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?chanID=sa003&articleID=000C1ED0-F88B-1EDC-8E1C809EC588EF21). So if you're fabulously rich, there doesn't seem to be any immediate barrier to making a glove, besides maybe having to buy out a particular scientist or two.

Hey, it's beating that whole "artificial spider silk from goats" project, at least. They've been GMing things for over a decade to try and make that stuff.

I knew of artificial versions being made. I think I even read this article. Another one I read the hairs were made from some kind of hydrophilic plastic so it only worked about five times before the hairs stuck together from the water at those scales messing them up(causing them to bunch and stick together) The hairs from the electron microscope photo in that article look different than the ones they were having problems with. I wonder what they used. I'd guess it's hydrophobic. If they could make them out of silicone rubber or even titanium that would be even better. Are steels, titanium and other metals hydrophobic, anyone know? Now no one be a smart@ss and say sodium or potasium are hydrophilic.

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Here they are. It's just a few of the about 100,000 on each toe though.
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2005-3/965110/microsetae.JPG

[Ohmer]

Originally posted by SkepticJ
So since you seem to be a bit more on the inside than me do you have an educated guess as to how long until I can go to the hardware store and buy a roll of Use Again tape made from nylon fiber weave with a silicone rubber coating on the outside; one side being of silicone setae? And gloves and boots for rock climbing. I love climbing. How long must I wait?[rocking back and forth in a creaky chair and whistling impatiently]

Sorry, I haven’t been paying attention to this thread. I don’t actually talk to Kellar that often. I doubt he would know anyway. I think the article that dilb linked to is probably your best bet. Kellar has done the science part. Now it’s and engineering problem. We don’t have an engineering department.

I don’t know if it would be practical to try to make something out of real gecko skin. Having a sample yourself, what do you think?

[Correa Neto]

Originally posted by SkepticJ
Why not? Tell her you're getting one or you'll buy a fossa.:D

Her arguments regarded the size of a full-grown iguanna and the mess it could make at home. Nothing that a fossa could not outclass with ease.;) Would be cool, but can´t think how to get one here in Brazil.

She accepted (with relutance)an axolotl, but I have not seen them for sale around here for a long time.

[Johnny Pneumatic]

Originally posted by Ohmer
I don’t know if it would be practical to try to make something out of real gecko skin. Having a sample yourself, what do you think?

Let me put it this way, I wouldn't trust my weight to a glove with a bunch of gecko toe skins glued onto the fingers. Now for roach sized robots, fine.
I think the goal is to just make a cheap synthetic version. Farming geckos would be really costly. You'd have to keep close track of hundreds of thousands of them with cameras or people to keep them from eating their skin. They'd have to be feed, watered, kept warm, cages cleaned etc. What velcro does from bur seeds engineers have to do from geckos. Velcro wouldn't be economical and durable if the tiny hooks came from bur seeds now would it?