Spider silk

Spider silk is a widely used material, produced by spiders in specific locations, known as 'spider silk quarries'.

Overview
Spider silk is one the strongest and toughest biological materials in existance. The Homelanders observed its properties for a long time and decided that they can use such thing in their everyday life.

Production
The Homelanders used the type of spiders that is able to spun the strongest webs among all other spiders. They genetically modified spiders, making them more suitable for mass production and multiplying as well as easily adaptable.

The spiders are placed in certain locations, mostly caves, with the best microclimate for their vital activity, which also stimulates them to spun more webs than usual.

They are drinking water with a certain contain of graphene and carbon nanotubes, which increases the strength and toughness of their webs tenfold on average.

At due time, automatic extractors visit the locations and gather the web, transporting it to the processing plants, where they are being transformed into required forms by the AI-controlled robots.

Sometimes the Homelanders gather spider silk themselves, coming into direct tactile contact with spiders. Since they can easily manipulate or diminish any fears, they feel only curiosity, tickling or indifference when spiders crawl all over their bodies.

Usage
Because of its properties, spider silk is used in production of various goods, construction and reinforcement of several materials.

Replacement
There was a number of suggestion to use spider silk as a part of the Homelanders' inner structure, reinforcing it further. Many projects are launched to improve the web and to weave it into the CBNI nanocomposite. A new name for an improved nanocomposite is SSCBI (spider silk, carbon, boron, nitrogen, inorganic).

The replacement was discarded, though. Serious advancements in CNT production made these nanotubes much tougher than even the toughest spider silk fiber possible, so instead of creating a new composite, the Homelanders just decided to use spider silk for other purposes.