Abstract
Biological materials such as chiton tooth, squid beak, and byssal threads of bivalves have inspired the development of new technologies. To this end, we have characterized the acellular components in the buccal mass of the terrestrial slug Ariolimax californicus (banana slug). These components are the radula, the jaw, and the odontophore. In the radula, calcium-rich denticles are tightly interlocked one to the other on top of a nanofibrous chitin membrane. The jaw has a nanostructured morphology made of chitin to achieve compression resistance and is directly linked to the foregut cuticle, which has a protective nanofibrous structure. Finally, in the odontophore, we observed a structurally elastic microstructure that interfaces soft tissues with a highly stressed radula membrane. Based on those observations, we discuss the interaction between these components and highlight how the materials in these task-specific components have evolved. This structure-properties-function study of the A. californicus’ buccal mass may aid in the design and fabrication of novel bioinspired materials.
Original language | English |
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Article number | e0212249 |
Journal | PLoS ONE |
Volume | 14 |
Issue number | 8 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 1 Aug 2019 |
Externally published | Yes |
Bibliographical note
Publisher Copyright:© 2019 Montroni et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Funding
This work is supported by the Office of Naval Research Award (N000141410724), and start-up funding at the University of California Santa Cruz. Part of this work was performed at the Stanford Nano Shared Facilities (SNSF), supported by the National Science Foundation under award ECCS-1542152.
Funders | Funder number |
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Stanford Nano Shared Facilities | |
National Science Foundation | 1542152, ECCS-1542152 |
Office of Naval Research | N000141410724 |
University of California, Santa Cruz |