Hacker News

points by vessenes 3 days ago | 0 comments

There's a lot of fundamental science to be done in space; some forms of crystal are much easier to grow, chemical reactions and biological interactions etc. etc. For reference, it wasn't long ago NASA was trying to figure out if spiders could form webs in space.

[–] kbutler 3 days ago

"When gravity is involved, the golden orb spiders will happily build their asymmetrical webs, and sit facing downwards waiting for prey. In space, their webs were more symmetrical, however when there was light, the spiders used it as a reference point and built their webs as if the light was the opposite to 'downwards'."

https://www.sciencealert.com/here-s-what-happens-to-spiders-... (with video)

[–] psunavy03 3 days ago

Spoiler alert: they can.