The orb weaver spider Meta bourneti was found in the vaults of the Egyptian Avenue of the cemetery in Islington.

BBC: Meta bourneti spider

Their 70, 000-gene chromosomes have been manipulated to include a gene from the orb weaver, a palm-size spider that spins the world's toughest natural material.

FORBES: Charlotte's Goat

By injecting the orb weaver gene into the father of Mille and Muscade, Nexia bred she-goats with mammary glands able to produce the complex proteins that make up spider silk.

FORBES: Charlotte's Goat

Orb-weaver spiders attract insects to their webs with ultraviolet (UV) decorations, according to a new study.

BBC: Quiz of the week's news

The function of the intricate patterns in the webs of orb-weaver spiders is subject to much debate in the scientific community.

BBC: Quiz of the week's news

This suggests that insertion of the second palp was enough to trigger death, even in the absence of a genuine female orb-weaver.

ECONOMIST: Why self-sacrifice makes perfect sense for spiders