PHOTOS: Olympics Opening Ceremony Bursts With Color #7

Beijing, China, August 8, 2008—Illuminated Olympic rings take center stage amid a sea of spectators during the three-hour plus opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympic Games.

Held in the iconic National Stadium—also known as the ''Bird's Nest''—,the much-anticipated opening ceremony drew over cheering crowd of over 91,000.

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PHOTOS: Olympics Opening Ceremony Bursts With Color #6

Beijing, China, August 8, 2008—A martial artist displays her skills during the opening ceremonies for the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing's National Stadium, also called the Bird's Nest.

Many styles of martial arts are believed to have originated in China. Zhang Yimou, the choreographer for the Olympics ceremony, is internationally famous for directing the blockbuster martial-arts films Hero (2002) and House of Flying Daggers (2004).

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PHOTOS: Olympics Opening Ceremony Bursts With Color #5

Beijing, China, August 8, 2008—Robed in vibrant blue, performers at the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympic Games evoke China's maritime history with oars assembled to form pictures of Ming dynasty treasure ships.

Billion's of people around the world watched the opening ceremony, directed by Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou, on television.

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PHOTOS: Olympics Opening Ceremony Bursts With Color #4

Beijing, China, August 8, 2008—Traditionally dressed dancers perform at the 2008 Summer Olympic Games opening ceremony.

The show, staged at the city's new national stadium, nicknamed the Bird's Nest, included more than 15,000 performers and illustrated China's history from ancient times to today.

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PHOTOS: Olympics Opening Ceremony Bursts With Color #3

Beijing, China, August 8, 2008—Against a blurry background and flashing lights, a performer robed in traditional garments gazes into the immense crowd attending the opening ceremony at Beijing's National Stadium.

The dazzling ceremony highlighted Chinese art, architecture, and imperial power, while also emphasizing the Olympic and Confucian ideal of harmony.

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PHOTOS: Olympics Opening Ceremony Bursts With Color #2

Beijing, China, August 8, 2008—Moving in perfect harmony, red-costumed dancers perform on intricately decorated floor's during the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympic Games.

The complex choreography of the show—intended to showcase achievements of Chinese culture and history—took nearly seven years to plan and cost around $40 billion U.S. dollars, BBC News reported.

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PHOTOS: Olympics Opening Ceremony Bursts With Color #1

Beijing, China, August 8, 2008—Fireworks light up the sky over the Beijing National Stadium—also known as the Bird's Nest—during the 2008 Summer Olympics opening ceremony.

China kicked off the 29th Olympic Games with a colorful celebration of its ancient history and modern might. The event—which drew crowds of around 91,000—featured a 50-minute spectacle with 15,000 performers, an array of fireworks, and ancient drum playing, the Agence France-Presse news service reported.

Over the next 16 days, approximately 10,000 Olympic athletes representing 205 countries will compete in events ranging from archery to fencing to sailing.

In anticipation of hot, smog-choked Beijing, many athletes engaged in special training techniques to keep on top of their game.

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Roman "Curse Tablet" Discovered in England

Archaeologists in Leicester, England, have recently uncovered a treasure trove of Roman and medieval artifacts, including a 1,700-year-old Roman "curse tablet."

Curse tablets were metal scrolls on which ancient Romans wrote spells to exact revenge for misdeeds, often thefts of money, clothing, or animals.

Such tablets have been discovered previously in Britain, often near ancient Roman temple sites, but this is the first one to be found in Leicester.

The Leicester tablet, which was uncovered near the ruins of a large Roman townhouse dating from the second century A.D., was found unrolled. Curse tablets were typically rolled up and nailed to posts inside temples or shrines.

The newfound tablet appears to have been written by, or on behalf of, a man named Servandus, whose cloak had been stolen.

The writer inscribed a curse into a sheet of lead, asking the god Maglus to destroy the thief.

Measuring around 8 inches (20 centimeters) long and 3 inches (7 centimeters) wide, the tablet reads:

"To the god Maglus, I give the wrongdoer who stole the cloak of Servandus. Silvester, Roimandus … that he destroy him before the ninth day, the person who stole the cloak of Servandus …" A list of the names of 18 or 19 suspects follows.

Richard Buckley, co-director of the University of Leicester Archaeological Services, which is conducting the excavation, said the discovery provides crucial clues about life in Roman Britain. The names on the lead sheet are of particular interest, he noted.

"Some of [the names] are Celtic, and some are Roman. It helps us to understand the cultural makeup of the population," he said.

The tablets are thought to have been issued by ordinary people, rather than the wealthy, Buckley added, which helps explain why a missing garment called for action from the gods.

"If a cloak is all that you have, then it is pretty important," he said.

The excavations are part of a major dig involving a team of 60 archaeologists from the University of Leicester.

Over the last three years nearly 10 percent of the city center has been excavated prior to the construction of new commercial and residential development.

The dig has produced a wealth of artifacts from the period when the Roman Empire ruled Britain, from about A.D. 43 to 410.

In addition to Servandus' curse tablet, the Roman townhouse excavation has produced another curse tablet that has yet to be translated, along with thousands of shards of pottery, Roman weighing scales, coins, brooches, gaming pieces, animal bone, and hairpins.

At other sites in the city the archaeologists have uncovered medieval churches dating from the 11th to the 16th centuries, as well as graveyards with more than 1,600 burial sites.

The archaeologists also found a medieval street frontage of four properties, one of which had evidence of a brewery in its backyard.

Iron Age Warrior with Roman Links Found in U.K.

The grave of an ancient British warrior with tantalizing Roman connections has been unearthed in southern England, archaeologists say.

The 2,000-year-old skeleton of the tribal king or nobleman was found buried with military trappings, including a bronze helmet and an ornate shield both of a style previously unknown in Britain, experts say

The Iron Age man, who died in his 30s, was discovered in June at the site of a new housing development in North Bersted on England's southeastern coast.


"What we've found is of national and international importance," said dig team member Mark Taylor, senior archaeologist at West Sussex County Council.

Unique Discoveries

Pottery—including three large jars placed at the foot of the grave—date the site to between A.D. 40 and A.D. 60, the team said.

A bronze shield boss was found along with semicircular latticework plates that are thought to have decorated the shield.

The ornate artwork is unique "certainly in the U.K. and Europe, as far as we know," Taylor said.

The scroll patterning most closely resembles that of mainland Europe's La Tène culture, named after a late Iron Age site in Switzerland, Taylor noted.

The domed helmet likely had a similar origin, according to John Creighton, an archaeologist from the University of Reading.

Creighton, who specializes in the late Iron Age period, said it appears to be a Celtic-style Mannheim helmet—the first one ever found in Britain.

A greater mystery is a large, iron-framed structure that was placed on top of the warrior's body.

The study team suspects the object was a household item intended for use in the afterlife rather than the remains of a coffin.

"My hunch is that it was some usable part of the domestic riches that went into the grave with this chap," Taylor said.

The corroded object may have been a "fire dog," which was used to burn wood inside the home, he suggested.

Roman Alliances

Experts say the burial may provide important new evidence of Roman influence in the region before the Roman conquest of England in A.D. 43.


Alliances forged by the Romans with southern tribal kings after Julius Caesar (see photo) arrived in 55 B.C. are thought to have involved taking hostages.

"One of the tempting and really exciting prospects is that the find might fulfill the theory that the sons of nobility may have been sent to Rome or sent abroad to undertake military training or to complete their education," team member Taylor said.

"It was all part of the empire-building process of that time to secure loyal, high-status client kings in the countries that were to become part of the Roman Empire."

Creighton, of the University of Reading, says the newly discovered grave adds to recent "astonishing finds of metalwork demonstrating a close link between Britain and the Roman world in the years before the conquest."

(Related: "Roman 'Curse Tablet' Discovered in England")

Astonishing Finds

Scientific analysis of the warrior may reveal more evidence of Roman links, experts say.

"Hopefully, in six months … we'll have a lot more information," Taylor said.

For example, isotope analysis will reveal the chemical signature of the water the warrior drank, which could show if he lived overseas in his youth.

aThe tests may similarly indicate his diet, according to Steve Ford, director of Thames Valley Archaeological Services, which led the excavation.

"We might also find out what killed him—whether there had been any traumas such as broken bones or knife wounds," Ford said.

Ancient Olympics Mixed Naked Sports, Pagan Partying

This year the Olympic Games return to their birthplace in Greece. But much has changed since the first games were held there almost three millennia The True Story of the Ancient Games, to hear what the first Olympics were really like.ago.


The Olympic Games were held every four years from 776 B.C. to A.D. 394, making them the longest-running recurring event in antiquity. What was the secret of the games' longevity?

It was the sheer spectacle of it. Sports [were] one part of a grand, all-consuming extravaganza. It was first and foremost a religious event, held on the most sacred spot in the ancient world. It had this incredible aura of tradition and sanctity.

Today's Olympics is a vast, secular event, but it doesn't have the religious element of the ancient Olympics, where sacrifices and rituals would take up as much time as the sports. And there were all these peripheral things that came with the festival: the artistic happenings, new writers, new painters, new sculptors. There were fire-eaters, palm readers, and prostitutes.

This was the total pagan entertainment package.

Today the Olympics are celebrated for their noble ideals of competition, friendship and culture. Do we find those ideals in the ancient games?

We have a very sentimental attitude toward the ancient games. But this romanticized image with gentlemanly behavior and chivalry was largely devised by Victorian scholars in the 19th century.

Perhaps the most inspiring ancient ideal was the moratorium on war during the games, a sacred truce that allowed travelers to safely get to the games. But the ancient Greeks were not as idealistic as to try to stop all wars. They just didn't want anything that interfered with the operation of the games. If you wanted to have a war in Sicily, the truce wouldn't stop you at all.

There were times when the truce fell apart. In 364 B.C. the regular organizers lost control of the games, because they had become involved in politics. To get revenge, they attacked the games' new organizers in the middle of a wrestling match. They had this pitched battle going on inside the sanctuary, with archers up on the temples.

The fans took it in stride. They stopped watching the wrestling match and instead watched the battle, applauding as if these were opposing teams at a sports match.

What is the origin of the games?

This has been lost in the mist of time. The ancient Greeks had many mythological reasons for why they were held, but no one knows for sure.


How did the athletes prepare themselves for the Games?

They had to appear at the [nearby] city of Elis a month before the games. This was the first Olympic village. There, they had to submit to a grueling training regime designed to weed out those who weren't up to Olympic standards.

While there was no shame in dropping out before the games, athletes who dropped out during the actual games were humiliated. There is a story of one huge wrestler showing up for training. As soon as he took his clothes off, all the other athletes dropped out because they all knew they couldn't beat this guy.

Were the athletes on any special diets?

Some of the dietary fads in antiquity were probably no more logical than what we see today. The traditional diets were very simple: olives, bread, feta cheese, and a reasonable amount of meat. But one wrestler went on an all-fig diet. Doctors would tell athletes they shouldn't eat pork that had been raised on certain berries.

There were a lot of performance-enhancing potions floating around. Lizard's flesh, eaten a certain way, for example, became magic.

Why did the athletes compete in the nude?

The truth is that no one knows. According to one story, it began when a runner lost his loincloth and tripped on it. Everyone took off his loincloth after that. But ancient historians have traced it back to initiation rites—young men walking around naked and sort of entering manhood.

We know how fundamental nudity was to Greek culture. It really appealed to the exhibitionism and the vanity of the Greeks. Only barbarians were afraid to show their bodies. The nude athletes would parade like peacocks up and down the stadium. Poets would write in a shaky hand these wonderful odes to the bodies of the young men, their skin the color of fired clay.

But other cultures, like the Persians and the Egyptians, looked at these Greek men oiling one another down and writhing in the mud, and found it very strange. They believed it promoted sexual degeneracy.

Was homosexuality accepted?

The Greeks would not have understood the word. Sexual acts between two grown men would have been considered entirely shocking. But pederasty was inherent to the Greek gymnasium culture, and you had all these men mentoring pre-pubescent boys. It was socially accepted and considered part of a boy's education, but it wasn't discussed openly.

Of course, women did not compete in the Olympics.

That's right. Married [women] weren't even allowed into the stands, though young women and virgins were allowed in. Fathers brought their daughters to the games hoping they would get married to one of the champions.

Prostitution was rampant. Women were brought in from all over the Mediterranean. It's been said that a prostitute could make as much as money in five days during the Olympics as she would in the rest of the year.

But there was a special sporting event for women.

Yes, it was kind of a second string of the festival. The [women's] games were held at Olympia and dedicated to Zeus's consort Hera. The young women ran in short tunics with their right breast exposed as an homage to the Amazon warrior women, a race of female super warriors that was believed to have cauterized their right breast so as not to impede their javelin throwing.

In Sparta there were women wrestling. There's a great story of a Roman senator traveling from afar to see these Spartan women, who were legendarily beautiful and muscular. He got so excited that he jumped in the ring. We don't have any records of whether he won or lost, but we have to assume that he enjoyed himself.

How popular were the male athletes?

They were as close as you could get to being a demigod in the mortal world. You would gain incredible prestige and wealth from an Olympic victory. You never had to work again.

Officially, the winner was given an olive wreath. But your home city would give you piles of money, honors like front seats at the theater, lifetime pensions, vats of olive oil, maybe even priesthood. Your name would be passed down from generation to generation. You became part of the very fabric of history.

Why did this sports mania take place in Greece and not elsewhere?

For two reasons, I think. First, Greece has this gorgeous environment. It was a land of the great outdoors, with beautiful Mediterranean weather. You could go swimming or hiking in the mountains. You have to have decent weather if you're going to be running around naked all day.

That converges with this incredible competitiveness that the Greeks have. For whatever reason, the Greeks would just compete about everything. There are hilarious stories of travelers meeting in inns and having eating races. It was inevitable that they would have these formal sporting events.

But sports were just one part of what you've called the Woodstock of antiquity. What was it like for the spectators?

To be a spectator at the Olympic Games was an incredibly uncomfortable experience. It makes modern sports fans seem like a pretty flaky bunch. First of all, if you came from Athens, you had to walk 210 miles [340 kilometers] to get to the site.

Olympia is in the middle of nowhere. It's a beautiful place, very idyllic. But it's basically a collection of three temples and a running track, with one inn reserved for the wealthy.

The organizers had it pretty easy in ancient times. They only had to chase a few sheep and cattle off the running track and temples. Everyone just turned up and had to look after himself. If you're rich, you put up a tent and you had servants. But the rank-and-file spectators plunked down anywhere.

In the high summer it was incredibly hot. The two rivers that converge at Olympia dried up. Nobody could wash. There was no drinking water, and people collapsed from heat stroke.

There was no sanitation, so the odors were quite pungent. Once you got into the stadium, there were no seats, only grassy banks. The word stadium comes from the Greek stadion, which means "a place to stand." But it was an incredible atmosphere with an amazing sense of tradition. People were standing on the very hill where Zeus wrestled his father [according to legend].

How many people showed up?

There were an estimated 40,000 spectators, and probably as many hangers-on, like vendors, writers, artists, prostitutes, and their shepherds.

What about some of the most famous names of the time?

Plato was a great wrestling fan. He showed up at the games incognito and stayed in makeshift barracks. He used to invite people to come and see him in Athens after the games. They would go there and realize he was the most famous man in Greece. Sophocles was a great handball fan.

Almost all Greek intellectuals were sports fans, and the games [were] also a great literary event. Herodotus debuted his famous history at the Olympics.

Did the games make any money?

The local farmers and producers certainly made a lot of money, but not the organizers. They didn't charge for entrance. They were aristocrats who weren't in it for the money but for the prestige of organizing the most important events in ancient Greece.

There must have been a lot of boozing.

Yes, you find the first sports bars in ancient Greece. Normally the Greeks didn't get terribly drunk. But this was like five days of living it up. People didn't sleep much at all. Students would organize these symposia that turned into drunken orgies.

Despite this debauchery, the Games had a spiritually profound meaning.

The sanctuary of Zeus was the most sacred place in the ancient world. The gods paid as much attention to the sports results as mortals. Athletes offered sacrifices nonstop to the gods, and the gods were even meant to have competed in the Olympics at an early stage.


They didn't have some of the things that we associate with the games today, like the torch relay.

The torch thing was really devised for the 1936 Nazi games. Hitler was fascinated with the ancient Greek world. He had all these theories that Spartans were this Aryan super race. Carl Diem, a sidekick of his, came up with this idea of carrying the torch from Olympia to Berlin.

But the torch and the opening ceremony transcended those rather sordid origins, and it became this wonderful tradition.

What about the Olympic flame?

Every sanctuary had its eternal flame. As a symbol, fire has been an important part of ancient Greek culture.

What was the opening ceremony like?

It was just as spectacular as it is today, the athletes filing into the temple, where they had to give their oath before a terrifying statue of Zeus wielding these thunderbolts. They had to swear over this bloody slice of boar's flesh that they would obey the rules of the game and use no unfair means to gain victory.

The judges were concerned that athletes would use performance-enhancing potions. But even more popular was placing curses on your opponents. There are stories of athletes veering off course [or] not being able to make it out of the starting blocks.

Emperor Nero comes to the Games and wins the chariot race, even though he falls out of the chariot. That was the low ebb, really. Having said that, the Olympics were considered the cleanest of the athletic games.

Let's talk about the actual sports. The chariot race was perhaps the most eagerly anticipated event. Why?

It was the most aristocratic event. It was also very violent. It was the Indianapolis 500 of antiquity. If you've seen the Charlton Heston version of Ben Hur, it gives you a very good idea of the nail-biting tension that was invoked by this event.

It was very dangerous, with crashes between chariots and chariots veering off the course and into the audience. They would go 12 laps around the stadium.

The tight corners were the most dangerous part. There were usually 40 chariots in the race. In one race, with 21 chariots starting, only 1 finished. That gives you an idea of just how dangerous this race was.

Running was the oldest event, but what about the marathon?

The ancient games didn't actually have a marathon. The three-mile [five-kilometer] dolichos was the longest running event in the early ancient games.

The marathon is a Victorian invention, based on a story about the Battle of Marathon. A courier, Philippides, who fought in the battle, dashed from the battlefield to bring news of the Greek victory to Athens. Once there, he collapsed and died.

The 26.3-mile [42.3-kilometer] distance from Marathon to Athens is the length of the modern marathon races around the world.

Even these three-mile [five-kilometer] races must have been pretty tough. Athletes certainly didn't have scientifically designed Nikes and Reeboks at the time.

I ran in Olympia, and it's definitely hard on your feet. At the games they put a layer of sand over the running track to soften it, but it was still very rough. The ancient Greeks just had harder feet. When you're running around with no shoes all your life, they become like a hobbit's, probably.

One unusual thing was that there was no oval running track. Everyone was running back and forth on this straight running track that looks like an airstrip. They had turning posts at the ends. You would go around with a group, which offered plenty of opportunities to accidentally trip people.

Today the decathlon is considered one of the most prestigious events and a true test of an athlete's greatness. How was the pentathlon looked upon in ancient Greece?

They started out with the discus, which was followed by the long jump, which was considered the most aesthetically pleasing, which was a big deal to the Greeks. Athletes jumped from a standing start, and it was done to flute music. Then there was the javelin event, followed by a sprint and a wrestling match.

The guys who were best at the pentathlon wouldn't be the best at the specialty events, but people would admire their versatility and great skill.

Some of the other events were very violent.

The combat events on the fourth day were very popular with the rank and file. The wrestling was similar to today's Greco-Roman wrestling. But the boxing was more exotic. Guys pummeled each other to the head using their fists with leather thongs wrapped around them. Body blows were actually forbidden. There were no rounds and no weight restrictions.

There are vivid tales of people's faces being pummeled to a bloody pulp. One boxer didn't want to give his opponent the satisfaction of knocking out his teeth, so he swallowed them all.

The third combat sport, the pankretion, is the most exotic to us. The only thing banned was eye gouging. Anything else goes. Bone breaking was common. One guy became known as "Mr. Digits," because he would break his opponent's fingers. Strangulation was encouraged.

To win, the other person had to submit, so you really had to knock the person out. And you're doing this in the nude, so people are going for the groin. It would have been an extremely uncomfortable event.

There were no team sports.

No, the Greeks were very individualistic. Athletes represented themselves first and their city-state second. There was no second place in the ancient games, no Victorian ideals of a handshake and gentlemanly slap on the back for a game well played. If you lost, you'd scamper home through the back streets. Your mother wouldn't even talk to you.

How would these athletes have performed against today's elite?

That's hard to say, because the Greeks didn't share our obsession with keeping records. They didn't have stopwatches. It was very much the winner of the moment.

Remember, the gene pool was much smaller in ancient Greece, a few million people. Now the athletes are chosen from billions of people around the world. I think the ancient Greeks would probably have a pretty rough time. Maybe they'd do well in events like wrestling. God knows they knew a few tricks.

Why did the ancient games end in A.D. 394?

They end when the Christian emperor Theodosius I bans all pagan festivals. The Christians hated the Olympic Games—the celebration of the human body, these guys running around naked, drinking, fornicating, the whole bit.

The end came as an incredible shock to the psyche of the ancient Greeks. They assumed quite logically that the games would go on forever.

Ancient Olympic Chariot Racetrack Located?

As the Beijing Olympics draw near, archaeologists are reporting the discovery of the long-lost chariot race track at the Greek birthplace of the games.

German researchers claim to have identified the hippodrome at Olympia, in Western Greece, some 1,600 years after the historic sports venue disappeared under river mud.

The ancient circuit, where Olympic competitors raced in chariots or on horseback, was found in May by a team including Norbert Müller of Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany.

Müller, a sports historian, declared the find "an archaeological sensation."

Researchers located the site using geomagnetic technology, a method that allows archaeologists to trace ancient structural features hidden beneath the soil.

Part of the oblong track's distinctive outline was documented some seven feet (two meters) beneath fields and olive groves and extended almost 656 feet (200 meters) in length.

East of the sanctuary of the Greek god Zeus, the track ran parallel to the stadium at Olympia where athletes performed, according to Müller and co-researcher Christian Wacker of the German Sports and Olympic Museum in Köln (Cologne), Germany.

Outlines of walls or ramparts were highlighted, "which can be most clearly connected with the ancient hippodrome," the researchers said in a statement.

The findings provide the "first clear indications" of the hippodrome's location, they added.

Ancient Mystery

The exact position of the hippodrome has long been a mystery, even though archaeologists have been excavating at Olympia since 1875.

Situated on the floodplain of the Alfeiós River, the site was buried under silt some 1,600 years ago.

Pausanias, a second-century travel writer, left a detailed account of the track, including its V-shaped starting stalls and their elaborate opening mechanism, as well as its sharp turns, marker posts, and altars.

A circle of stones measuring about 33 feet (10 meters) in diameter also was revealed by the soil survey, which may represent one of the structures Pausanias referred to, Müller said.

Slow Down

The German Archaeological Institute at Athens, which was also involved in the research, is more cautious about the findings.

Wolf-Dietrich Niemeier, the institute's director, cautioned that a direct link has not yet been identified between the recently discovered outlines and the ancient racecourse.

"It could be the hippodrome but I don't think we can say that the hippodrome is 'discovered,'" Niemeier said. "This really has to be confirmed by test excavations and so on."

But the research site is in the "right area" for the hippodrome based on historical evidence, Niemeier said.

Any excavations would first require the permission of Greek authorities, he added.

Hard to Find

Richard Woff of the British Museum in London described the difficulty of pinning down the hippodrome's precise location.

Woff, who isn't connected to the research, said the hippodrome's main structures were most likely its starting stalls and the central barrier that charioteers and riders raced around.

"Apart from that, there probably wasn't a lot to it," he said. "So not only was it buried by silt, there's also the fact that there wasn't much to bury."

The hippodrome events were the most prestigious at the ancient Games, which were under way by 776 B.C.

"The main reason for this was that only the wealthiest people could afford to enter the chariot and horse races," Woff said. "Horses were very much a status symbol in ancient Greece."

While paid professionals would have ridden the horses and chariots, the winning prize went to the owner, he said.

This gave women their only opportunity of claiming an Olympic title since they were barred from either competing in or watching the Games.

"There's evidence a woman did win at the Olympics by doing that," Woff said.

Meanwhile the chariot drivers, who wore long white tunics, are thought to have been the only competitors at Olympia who didn't perform in the nude.

Tyrannosaurus Rex

Tyrannosaurus Rex Profile

Tyrannosaurus rex was one of the largest meat-eating dinosaurs that ever lived. Everything about this ferocious predator, from its thick, heavy skull to its 4-foot-long (1.2-meter-long) jaw, was designed for maximum bone-crushing action.

Fossil evidence shows that Tyrannosaurus was about 40 feet (12 meters) long and about 15 to 20 feet (4.6 to 6 meters) tall. Its strong thighs and long, powerful tail helped it move quickly, and its massive 5-foot-long (1.5-meter-long) skull could bore into prey.

T. rex's serrated, conical teeth were most likely used to pierce and grip flesh, which it then ripped away with its brawny neck muscles. Its two-fingered forearms could probably seize prey, but they were too short to reach its mouth.

Scientists believe this powerful predator could eat up to 500 pounds (230 kilograms) of meat in one bite. Fossils of T. rex prey, including Triceratops and Edmontosaurus, suggest T. rex crushed and broke bones as it ate, and broken bones have been found in its dung.

Tyrannosaurus rex lived in forested river valleys in North America during the late Cretaceous period. It became extinct about 65 million years ago in the Cretaceous-Tertiary mass extinction.

Fast Facts

Type: Prehistoric
Diet: Carnivore
Size: 40 ft (12 m) long; 15 to 20 ft (4.6 to 6 m) tall
Did you know? Tyrannosaurus means "tyrant lizard."
Protection status: Extinct
Size relative to a bus:

Great White Shark

Great White Shark Profile

The legendary great white shark is far more fearsome in our imaginations than in reality. As scientific research on these elusive predators increases, their image as mindless killing machines is beginning to fade.

Of the 100-plus annual shark attacks worldwide, fully one-third to one-half are attributable to great whites. However, most of these are not fatal, and new research finds that great whites, who are naturally curious, are "sample biting" then releasing their victims rather than preying on humans. It's not a terribly comforting distinction, but it does indicate that humans are not actually on the great white's menu.

Great whites are the largest predatory fish on Earth. They grow to an average of 15 feet (4.6 meters) in length, though specimens exceeding 20 feet (6 meters) and weighing up to 5,000 pounds (2,268 kilograms) have been recorded.

They have slate-gray upper bodies to blend in with the rocky coastal sea floor, but get their name from their universally white underbellies. They are streamlined, torpedo-shaped swimmers with powerful tails that can propel them through the water at speeds of up to 15 miles (24 kilometers) per hour. They can even leave the water completely, breaching like whales when attacking prey from underneath.

Highly adapted predators, their mouths are lined with up to 3,000 serrated, triangular teeth arranged in several rows, and they have an exceptional sense of smell to detect prey. They even have organs that can sense the tiny electromagnetic fields generated by animals. Their main prey items include sea lions, seals, small toothed whales, and even sea turtles, and carrion.

Found in cool, coastal waters throughout the world, there is no reliable data on the great white's population. However, scientists agree that their number are decreasing precipitously due to overfishing and accidental catching in gill nets, among other factors, and they are listed as an endangered species.

Fast Facts

Type: Fish
Diet: Carnivore
Size: 15 ft (4.6 m) to more than 20 ft (6 m)
Weight: 5,000 lbs (2,268 kg) or more
Group name: School or shoal
Did you know? Great whites can detect one drop of blood in 25 gallons (100 liters) of water and can sense even tiny amounts of blood in the water up to 3 miles (5 kilometers) away.
Protection status: Endangered
Size relative to a bus:

Ancient Giant Shark Had Strongest Bite Ever, Model Says

Prehistoric megalodon—literally "megatooth"—sharks had the most powerful bite of any creature that has ever lived, according to a new model.

Its bite was strong enough to crush an automobile and far exceeded that of the great white shark and even Tyrannosaurus rex.

Known mostly from the large teeth it left behind, Carcharodon megalodon first appeared in Earth's seas about 16 million years ago (in the Neogene period) and dined on giant prehistoric turtles and whales.

"Megalodon's killing strategy was to bite the tails and flippers off large whales, effectively taking out their propulsion systems," said study leader Stephen Wroe of the University of New South Wales in Australia.

The prehistoric shark may have grown to lengths of over 50 feet (16 meters) and weighed up to 30 times more than the largest great white.

"A great white is about the size of the clasper, or penis, of a male megalodon," said Peter Klimley a shark expert at the University of California at Davis, who was not involved with the current research.

"Could Have Crushed a Small Car"

Wroe and his colleagues extrapolated the bite force of megalodon from data they collected from great whites.

The team created a computer model of a great white's skull, jaw, and head muscles from images generated by a computerized tomography (CT) scanner.

They then ran "crash test" simulations with the model to reveal the stresses and strains it could withstand and the strength of its bite.

The team estimated a great white could generate a maximum bite force of about 4,000 pounds (1,800 kilograms).

Because megalodon was much bigger than a great white, it might have chomped down on prey with a force of between 24,000 to 40,000 pounds (10,900 to 18,100 kilograms), the researchers say.

"Of course it would probably have broken most of its teeth in the exercise."

For comparison, T. rex, one of the largest land carnivores of all time, had a bite force that has been estimated at only 6,834 pounds (3,100 kilograms).


Jaw Structure

Most of what is known about megalodon comes from the study of its teeth, which have features that suggest they were arranged in a broad mouth. And animals with broad mouths typically have short snouts.

Animals with short snouts, furthermore, generally have more leverage when they bite and generate more force in the up-and-down direction, scientists say.

Klimley, of the University of California, said megalodon's powerful bite is consistent with the theory that the ancient shark had a pug nose.

Chuck Ciampaglio, a paleontologist at Wright State University in Ohio, is more skeptical.

Megalodon was likely not a direct ancestor of great whites, Ciampaglio said, so it "may have quite a different skull and jaw structure."

Also, megalodon may have used fewer muscles to power its bite than the model predicts.

"As an animal becomes larger, much more of the animal's weight is consumed by support structures, not muscles," Ciampaglio said.

Climate

One of the factors that influences climate is the angle of the sun's rays. In the tropics, between 23.5° N and 23.5° S, there is at least one time of year when the noontime sun is directly overhead and its rays hit at a direct angle. This produces a hot climate with relatively small temperature differences between summer and winter.

In the Arctic and Antarctic (north or south of 66.5° latitude), there are times of year when the sun is above the horizon 24 hours a day (a phenomenon known as midnight sun) and times when it never rises. Even in the summer, the sun is low enough for temperatures to be lower than in the tropics, but the seasonal changes are much greater than in equatorial regions. Interior Alaska has seen temperatures as high as 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius).

Farther from the Equator lie the temperate regions. These include the United States, Europe, China, and parts of Australia, South America, and southern Africa. They have the typical four seasons: winter, spring, summer, and fall.

Outside Influences

Climate is also controlled by wind, oceans, and mountains.

Winds bring moisture to land. North and south of the Equator the trade winds blow from the northeast and southeast, respectively. These winds converge in the tropics, forcing air to rise. This produces thunderstorms, humidity, and monsoons.

North and south of the trade winds, about 30° from the Equator, there is relatively little wind, and therefore little moisture blowing inland from the oceans. Also, dry air is sinking back to the surface, warming in the process. This is why many of the world's great desert regions—the Sahara, Arabia, Iran, Iraq, and chunks of Mexico—lie at the same latitude. A similar band of deserts lies to the south in Australia, South America, and southern Africa.

Mountains force wind to rise as it crosses over them. This cools the air, causing moisture to condense in clouds and rain. This produces a wet climate on the upwind side of the mountains and an arid "rain shadow" on the downwind side.

Oceans provide moisture that fuels rainstorms. They also buffer the temperature of coastal regions, regardless of latitude.

Climate Groups

In the early 1900s, climatologist Wladimir Köppen divided the world into five major climate groups.

Moist, tropical climates are hot and humid. Steppes and deserts are dry, with large temperature variations. Plentiful lakes, rivers, or nearby oceans give humid, midlatitude climates cool, damp winters, but they have hot, dry summers. Some of these climates are also called Mediterranean. Continental climates occur in the centers of large continents. Mountain ranges (or sheer distance) block off sources of moisture, creating dry regions with large seasonal variations in temperature. Much of southern Canada, Russia, and parts of central Asia would fall into this category. Cold, or polar, climates round out Köppen's list. A sixth region, high elevations, was later added to the classification system.

Malaria

The disease chiefly affects lowland tropical regions, where conditions favor Anopheles mosquitoes, which carry the malaria parasite plasmodium. It's the blood-seeking females that inject these microscopic invaders, each bite acting like an infected hypodermic needle.

Of the four kinds of plasmodia, Plasmodium falciparum is by far the most dangerous, responsible for about half of all malaria cases and 95 percent of deaths.

The parasite has a complicated life cycle, which begins in the mosquito's gut before moving to the salivary glands, where it awaits transfer to the next host. Once in a human's bloodstream, the parasite lodges in the liver, burrowing into cells where it feasts and multiplies. After a week or two the plasmodia burst out—around 40,000 replications for each parasite that entered the body. Next they target red blood cells, this time repeatedly, until there are billions of parasites in circulation. If this cycle isn't checked, the body starts to fail, because with so many oxygen-carrying red cells being destroyed there are too few left to sustain vital organs. Meanwhile, all it takes for the parasite to pass on its grim legacy is for another mosquito to stop off for a meal.

No Vaccine

Almost two-thirds of humans infected live in sub-Saharan Africa, which also bears around 90 percent of the global malaria death toll. A child there dies from the disease about every 30 seconds. Elsewhere, countries worst affected are in southern Asia and Latin America.

Those most vulnerable are young children, who have yet to develop any resistance to the disease, and pregnant women who have reduced immunity. Signs of infection include flu-like symptoms such as fever, shivering, headache, and muscle ache. The P. falciparum parasite can lead to life-threatening conditions such as brain damage (cerebral malaria), severe anemia, and kidney failure. Survivors are often left with permanent neurological damage.

For centuries the only widely known malaria remedy was quinine, which came from the bark of the cinchona tree of Peru and Ecuador. Then, in the 1940s, a synthetic drug was created using the compound chloroquine. Around the same time, the insecticide known as DDT was developed. These twin weapons led to a worldwide assault on malaria, eradicating the disease in many areas, including the United States and southern Europe.

But malaria has made a major comeback since the 1970s, partly because DDT use was severely restricted after it was found to be harmful to certain wildlife, and because the plasmodium parasite started becoming resistant to anti-malaria drugs.

With more people now falling sick from malaria than ever before, the need to tackle it has never been so urgent. The top priority, health experts say, is finding a vaccine—seen as the only surefire way of beating the disease.

What Is Global Warming?

We call the result global warming, but it is causing a set of changes to the Earth's climate, or long-term weather patterns, that varies from place to place. As the Earth spins each day, the new heat swirls with it, picking up moisture over the oceans, rising here, settling there. It's changing the rhythms of climate that all living things have come to rely upon.

What will we do to slow this warming? How will we cope with the changes we've already set into motion? While we struggle to figure it all out, the face of the Earth as we know it—coasts, forests, farms and snow-capped mountains—hangs in the balance.

Greenhouse effect

The "greenhouse effect" is the warming that happens when certain gases in Earth's atmosphere trap heat. These gases let in light but keep heat from escaping, like the glass walls of a greenhouse.

First, sunlight shines onto the Earth's surface, where it is absorbed and then radiates back into the atmosphere as heat. In the atmosphere, “greenhouse” gases trap some of this heat, and the rest escapes into space. The more greenhouse gases are in the atmosphere, the more heat gets trapped.

Scientists have known about the greenhouse effect since 1824, when Joseph Fourier calculated that the Earth would be much colder if it had no atmosphere. This greenhouse effect is what keeps the Earth's climate livable. Without it, the Earth's surface would be an average of about 60 degrees Fahrenheit cooler. In 1895, the Swedish chemist Svante Arrhenius discovered that humans could enhance the greenhouse effect by making carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas. He kicked off 100 years of climate research that has given us a sophisticated understanding of global warming.

Levels of greenhouse gases (GHGs) have gone up and down over the Earth's history, but they have been fairly constant for the past few thousand years. Global average temperatures have stayed fairly constant over that time as well, until recently. Through the burning of fossil fuels and other GHG emissions, humans are enhancing the greenhouse effect and warming Earth.

Scientists often use the term "climate change" instead of global warming. This is because as the Earth's average temperature climbs, winds and ocean currents move heat around the globe in ways that can cool some areas, warm others, and change the amount of rain and snow falling. As a result, the climate changes differently in different areas.

Aren't temperature changes natural?

The average global temperature and concentrations of carbon dioxide (one of the major greenhouse gases) have fluctuated on a cycle of hundreds of thousands of years as the Earth's position relative to the sun has varied. As a result, ice ages have come and gone.

However, for thousands of years now, emissions of GHGs to the atmosphere have been balanced out by GHGs that are naturally absorbed. As a result, GHG concentrations and temperature have been fairly stable. This stability has allowed human civilization to develop within a consistent climate.

Occasionally, other factors briefly influence global temperatures. Volcanic eruptions, for example, emit particles that temporarily cool the Earth's surface. But these have no lasting effect beyond a few years. Other cycles, such as El Niño, also work on fairly short and predictable cycles.

Now, humans have increased the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere by more than a third since the industrial revolution. Changes this large have historically taken thousands of years, but are now happening over the course of decades.

Why is this a concern?
The rapid rise in greenhouse gases is a problem because it is changing the climate faster than some living things may be able to adapt. Also, a new and more unpredictable climate poses unique challenges to all life.

Historically, Earth's climate has regularly shifted back and forth between temperatures like those we see today and temperatures cold enough that large sheets of ice covered much of North America and Europe. The difference between average global temperatures today and during those ice ages is only about 5 degrees Celsius (9 degrees Fahrenheit), and these swings happen slowly, over hundreds of thousands of years.

Now, with concentrations of greenhouse gases rising, Earth's remaining ice sheets (such as Greenland and Antarctica) are starting to melt too. The extra water could potentially raise sea levels significantly.

As the mercury rises, the climate can change in unexpected ways. In addition to sea levels rising, weather can become more extreme. This means more intense major storms, more rain followed by longer and drier droughts (a challenge for growing crops), changes in the ranges in which plants and animals can live, and loss of water supplies that have historically come from glaciers.

Scientists are already seeing some of these changes occurring more quickly than they had expected. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, eleven of the twelve hottest years since thermometer readings became available occurred between 1995 and 2006.

Extreme Rains to Be Supercharged by Warming, Study Says

Global warming could make extreme rains stronger and more frequent than previously forecast, a new study suggests.

Such a scenario could make floods fiercer, damage more crops, and worsen the spread of diseases such as malaria, scientists say.

Rainfall patterns are already shifting as Earth warms under a blanket of humanmade greenhouse gases, experts say.

Study co-author Richard P. Allan, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Reading in Berkshire, United Kingdom, said previous studies have shown that "wet regions are becoming wetter, and dry regions drier."

The study team analyzed satellite images of rainfall over tropical oceans over nearly two decades, from 1988 to 2004.

The researchers found that during El Niño years, which tend to be warmer, rain fell in heavier showers. An El Niño is a climate event where the flow of abnormally warm surface Pacific waters temporarily changes global weather patterns.

"This is something that climate models had predicted," Allan said. "But getting the data from observations is very important."

Many previous rainfall pattern studies have relied on measurements from rain gauges. Such gauges are sparsely distributed across land, Allan said, whereas satellites can see large areas as a whole.

Global Warming Forecast

Although our planet is warming overall, Earth's climate still varies between warmer and wetter El Niño years and cooler and drier La Niña years.

Looking at these changes in rainfall can give scientists a good estimate of what will happen with continued global warming, according to Allan and his co-author, Brian Soder of the University of Florida.

With continued global warming, the changes in Earth's rainfall patterns will be worse than previously forecast, Allan and Soder write.

"The models seem to underestimate the response in extreme rainfall with warming," Allan said.

For every 1.8 degree Fahrenheit (1 degree Celsius) rise in global temperature, heavy rain showers became more common, with most intense category jumping 60 percent, says the study, which will be published tomorrow in the journal Science.

During the 20th century, Earth's average global temperature rose about 1.2 degrees Fahrenheit (0.7 degrees Celsius). But researchers predict that bump will be dwarfed by the warming to come.

The latest UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report predicts at least three times as much warming—about 3.2 to 7.1 degrees Fahrenheit (2 to 4 degrees Celsius)—by the end of the 21st century

The uptick could drive a big jump in intense rainfall events, Allan and Soden argue.

Human Impact

Warmer air can hold more moisture. "So if the air is more moist, you get more heavy rainfall," Allan noted, adding that such extreme weather takes a toll on people.

With intense rains, "you can get flash flooding, and heavy rainfall can destroy crops," he said. "Those are the most immediate impacts."

Coupled with rising global temperatures, more frequent and intense rainfall has "major implications for infectious diseases," said Paul Epstein, a tropical disease expert at Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts.

"After floods one often sees clusters of vector-borne diseases—malaria, dengue fever, Japanese B encephalitis," Epstein said.

Floods often cause a jump in cholera and other water-borne diseases, as well as plague and other rodent-borne diseases, he added.

David Neelin, a climate scientist at the University of California in Los Angeles, takes a more cautious view of the study results.

"Rainfall changes remain among the hardest impacts of global warming to predict precisely," he said.

But, Neelin added, "Allan and Soden's results add fuel to the growing concern from a number of research groups [that] the extremes of rainfall may increase under global warming."

Black Widow Spider

Black Widow Spider Profile

Black widows are notorious spiders identified by the colored, hourglass-shaped mark on their abdomens. Several species answer to the name, and they are found in temperate regions around the world.

This spider's bite is much feared because its venom is reported to be 15 times stronger than a rattlesnake's. In humans, bites produce muscle aches, nausea, and a paralysis of the diaphragm that can make breathing difficult; however, contrary to popular belief, most people who are bitten suffer no serious damage—let alone death. But bites can be fatal—usually to small children, the elderly, or the infirm. Fortunately, fatalities are fairly rare; the spiders are nonaggressive and bite only in self-defense, such as when someone accidentally sits on them.

The animals most at risk from the black widow's bite are insects—and male black widow spiders. Females sometimes kill and eat their counterparts after mating in a macabre behavior that gave the insect its name. Black widows are solitary year-round except during this violent mating ritual.

These spiders spin large webs in which females suspend a cocoon with hundreds of eggs. Spiderlings disperse soon after they leave their eggs, but the web remains. Black widow spiders also use their webs to ensnare their prey, which consists of flies, mosquitoes, grasshoppers, beetles, and caterpillars. Black widows are comb-footed spiders, which means they have bristles on their hind legs that they use to cover their prey with silk once it has been trapped.

To feed, black widows puncture their insect prey with their fangs and administer digestive enzymes to the corpses. By using these enzymes, and their gnashing fangs, the spiders liquefy their prey's bodies and suck up the resulting fluid.

Fast Facts

Type: Bug
Diet: Carnivore
Average lifespan in the wild: 1 to 3 years
Size: 1.5 in (38 mm) long, 0.25 in (6.4 mm) in diameter
Weight: .035 ounce (1 gram)
Did you know? Black widow spiders are considered the most venomous spiders in North America.
Size relative to a paper clip:

Artificial Spider Silk Could Be Used for Armor, More

Scientists hope to soon be able to spin spider silk without the aid of spiders—achieving an age-old human quest to harness one of nature's most remarkable materials.

Randy Lewis is a professor of molecular biology at the University of Wyoming in Laramie. His team of researchers has successfully sequenced genes related to spider-silk production—uncovering the formula that spiders use to make silk from proteins. In the process the team acquired a better understanding of how the silk's structure is related to its amazing strength and elastic properties.

Their next task will be using what they've learned to spin spider silk themselves.

"Hopefully in the next month we'll start spinning fibers," Lewis told National Geographic News.

Scientists don't completely understand how spiders spin liquid protein into solid fibers. With their spinnerets, spiders somehow apply physical force to rearrange the proteins' molecular structure to turn the proteins into silk.

Understanding how spiders do this could someday result in new stronger and lighter materials that could replace plastics—and ease the cost to the environment that results from conventional plastic production. But duplicating spider silk in the lab has proven difficult.

Cracking the Code

By cracking the genetic code of spider silk, scientists hope not only to be able to duplicate the material but perhaps even to improve on it.

"We're trying to alter both the strength and elasticity of the natural silks," Lewis said. "We've made a number of different synthetic genes based on what we found in natural silks—but altered in ways to make them even stronger and more flexible. We're really trying to control elasticity, so you if come to me and ask for a certain tensile strength and elasticity, I can make a gene that will produce a fiber that does that for you."

Thomas Scheibel, from the department of chemistry at the Technical University of Munich, Germany, is engaged in similar types of "protein engineering." He recently published a review of his work in the journal Microbial Cell Factories.

"We're now not only after the uniqueness of the silk thread but the uniqueness of the single molecular building blocks within that thread," he said.

"We can play around with these modules and try to optimize structures for applications where you need unique specific properties—even those not found in natural silk," Scheibel said.

A range of products could someday ensue.

"I would start with something in the area of paper—paper that's strong, tough, can't be torn. For uses like banknotes silk could be a perfect material," Scheibel said.

"In the aircraft or automobile industry, think about a material that can absorb a lot of energy. If you have an accident [that causes a dent], it might be gone hours later, because the material can take up energy and reacquire its form. That's what happens to a web when an insect flies into the web."

Myriad of Potential Uses

Over hundreds of millions of years the 37,000 known species of spiders (and others unknown) have evolved and diversified many silks for their unique purposes. Best known and studied is silk secreted by a spider's major ampullate glands.

Orb-weaving spiders use this kind of silk like Spider-Man, as a dragline on which to make ascents and descents. The silk is also used to create spiders' familiar "wagon wheel" webs.

Spider silk has incredible tensile strength and is often touted as being several times stronger than steel of the same thickness. What's even more unique, however, is spider silk's elasticity.

"When we say spider silk is tougher than things like Kevlar [a plastic used to make body armor] that's what were talking about. Kevlar has higher tensile strength but it's not very stretchy," said Todd Blackledge, an entomologist at the University of Akron.

These properties suggest a potential for many applications for spider silk: extremely thin sutures for eye or nerve surgery, plasters and other wound covers, artificial ligaments and tendons, textiles for parachutes, protective clothing and body armor, ropes, fishing nets, and so on.

"One that's initially surprising is air bags," Lewis added. "Right now an air bag just sort of blasts you back into a seat. But if it were made out of this material it would actually be made to absorb energy and really reduce impact."

"Spidergoats"

Unlike silkworms, spiders tend to eat one another and cannot be effectively farmed. That's spawned a search for alternative silk sources. The most common method is introducing silk-spider genes into other organisms so that they can produce silk proteins that might later be used to create artificial silk threads. Host organisms range from simple bacteria to goats.

Quebec-based Nexia Biotechnologies created a stir in 2000 when it bred two "spidergoats" named Webster and Pete. The goats were altered with spider genes so that they could produce silk proteins in their milk. Nexia's artificial silk product is known as BioSteel, but the company is currently involved in a restructuring that has stalled research efforts.

Bacteria produce enough proteins for research work, but their long-term commercial production potential is unproven. Other efforts have focused on silk-producing plants such as tobacco or alfalfa and have met with some success.

But while producing spider-silk proteins is becoming more feasible, and scientists continually learn more about how to spin them into solid materials, major hurdles must be cleared before "spider products" become available.

So far, artificial fibers have lacked real spider silk's strength, and the artificial threads have been much wider than their natural counterparts. Before the advent of a spider-silk marketplace, human web weavers must close the technology gap on their arachnid counterparts.

Spiders Make Stronger Silk to Catch Bigger Prey

Common house spiders adjust their weapons depending on the task, says a new study that found the species weaves webs of stronger silk when bigger insects are more abundant.

The skill allows house spiders to save energy by weaving easier-to-make, weaker silk strings when their prey is smaller.

"We knew from our past research on black widows that cobweb spiders adjust their web architectures in response to different availabilities of prey," said study author Todd Blackledge at the University of Akron, in Ohio.

"But we didn't know much about how spiders might alter the silk used to spin cobwebs," he said.

Common house spiders—(Achaearanea tepidariorum)—are members of the Theridiidae family of cobweb spiders, which includes the black widow.

(Learn about black widow spiders.)

Up to the Task
Researchers fed 27 common house spiders identical weights of either large, fast-moving crickets or small, slow-moving pill bugs for a week. Later, they examined the spiders' silk.

The team found that silk threads spun by the spiders that had been given faster food were thicker, stiffer, and better at shock absorption.

"Silk spun by spiders fed crickets could support twice as much weight as silk spun by spiders fed pill bugs," said study co-author Cecilia Boutry, also of the University of Akron.

"A single thread from their web could support a cricket twice as heavy as the spider itself without breaking," she said.

The authors suggest that the spiders could be sensing the prey that they are encountering and building silk that is appropriate for the task.

The change of diet might also affect the type of webs the spiders weave, they say.

The research was recently published online in the Journal of Experimental Zoology.

Chemistry of Strength

"The complexity of what these spiders are able to do is pretty striking," said zoologist Brook Swanson of Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington.

"Spider silk is being revealed to be not just one substance, but an array of compounds that can do different things," said Swanson, who was not involved in the study.

Because of its incredible strength and shock absorbing properties, spider silk is the subject of research aiming harness the natural technology for bulletproof armor and other materials.

"We need to tease apart whether these silks are being woven in different ways by the spiders or if they are in fact chemically different from one another," Swanson said.

"Once we figure that out, we may be able to replicate this variation when we make [artificial] silk in the lab."