The marine sponge Monorhaphis chuni (M. Chuni) forms a glass
filament with a perfect periodic arrangement of nanopores employing a similar
method that is used for fabrication of man-made mesoporous nanomaterials
Materials made by man and those made by biological organisms
often deal with similar synthesis challenges – occasionally converging on an
analogous solution independently. One example is the giant glass rod that is
used by the sea sponge M. chuni to anchor itself in marine environments. A
collaborative effort by researchers from the Max Planck Institutes of Colloids
and Interfaces and of Microstructure Physics has now uncovered and analysed the
nanostructure of the filament passing through the centre of this giant glass
rod. The researchers discovered that it is structured almost exactly like the
nanoporous man-made nanomaterials, which are relevant for many applications in
fields such as biomedicine, sensor technology and chemical catalysis.