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As if the spiders were not already scary enough, it now turns out that they can fly using electricity.
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A male Linyphia spider on the lookout on his web (Photo: karayuschij, Getty Images / iStockphoto)

Research published on Thursday put an end to Long-lasting debate if spiders can use silk as they weave like a parachute to fly through the wind or if the flight is powered by static electricity reacting with silk. A study by Erica Morley, a sensory biophysicist at Bristol University, confirmed what Charles Darwin observed by observing hundreds of spiders flying 60 miles across the ocean and landing on his ship, the HMS Beagle

. Morley and the researchers confirmed this by showing for the first time in a laboratory how spiders use electrostatic forces to inflate.

When spiders leap from the ground and float in the sky, sometimes over thousands of kilometers, it's because of a "swelling process" where spiders lift their abdomen towards the sky, spin silk parachutes from 7 to 13 feet and fly away. A previous study confirmed that spiders fly by checking the wind and throwing their silk parachutes at the right time. The study, however, could not explain why multiple silk thread spiders use to inflate do not entangle in the wind.

Morley's research explains the lack of entanglement and explains why spiders can fly thousands of kilometers even when there is no wind outside. The strands do not entangle because each strand repels another in an electrostatic force. Their study also concluded that weather conditions are not the main driver of a spider balloons, but rather whether an electric field is present in the atmosphere.

"It is reasonable to badume that if electronic fields are ecologically relevant, spiders should be able to detect and respond to an electronic field by changing their behavior to engage in hot air balloons," says the study. .

Researchers placed Linyphiid spiders in a box that limited the movement of air but reflected the naturally occurring electric fields in atmospheric conditions. When the electric field was lit, the spiders showed a "significant increase in hot air ballooning". The behavioral change has shown that spiders can detect when electricity is present.

Once the spiders flew into the air, the researchers turned off the electric field. As a result, spiders would quickly fall out of the air to the ground, demonstrating that spiders need the order of electricity to inflate if the airflow is limited.

Although the wind plays an important role in the ballooning process and the spiders' journey of miles, this study shows that balloon behavior is triggered by electric fields.

Follow Lilly Price on Twitter: @lillianmprice

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