Cicada wings tear apart bacteria using nanoscale spikes

Nature : The veined wings of clanger cicadas are able to kill bacteria using nothing more than the wing’s physical structure. Elena Ivanova of the Swinburne University of Technology in Hawthorne, Australia, and her colleagues studied the structure to determine how that was possible. They discovered that the wings are covered with an array of hexagonal nanoscopic pillarsâmdash;blunt spikes similar in size to bacteria. When a bacterium hits the wing’s surface, the cell membrane sticks to the pillars while the rest of the cell is stretched down into the crevices. Ivanova’s team found that if the cell membrane is soft enough, the bacterium will rupture. Further study may allow the principles behind the structures to be applied in manmade materials for use on public surfaces, such as handrails, to kill infectious bacteria.