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r/askscience • … • u/The-Grim-Sleeper

What material are a spiders fangs made off?

The wikipedia page for Chelicerata (Spiders, Scorpions, ticks, horseshoe crabs, sea spiders, ...) are named that way for their "Chelicerae", the mouth parts, colloquially their "jaws". These Chelicerae may be shaped as either venom-injecting fangs or as miniature pincers (wholly distinct from the two large pincers a scorpion would have).

But neither Wikipedia page mentions what they are material they are made of. The assorted LLMs ever gleefully suggest that 'spiders are made of chitin and other proteins' and of course provide no source for this. It sounds plausible, but is it the whole truth? Are spiders fangs 'just chitin in a sharp shape', or do their fangs have more going on, like how Human (Mammel) teeth have a dentin core and a hard enamel surface for crushing?

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