video: Video shows the sea-dwelling sandcastle worm in a laboratory building its tube-shaped home out of glue it produces naturally and pieces of silicon cut from a silicon wafer normally used to make integrated circuits. In the intertidal zone, such worms build their tubes using pieces of shell, sand and their own glue. University of Utah bioengineer Russell Stewart has developed a synthetic version of the worm's glue, and hopes to perfect it so it can be used to bond bone fragments together in people who have fractured bones in joints such as the knees. The video speed is more than six times the worm's actual speed. view more
Credit: Rebekah Steren, University of Utah.