The fantasy Superhero " Spiderman·s " ability to walk effortlessly up walls is now a reality !!

“ Spiderman ” Theme Song Words written by Paul Francis Webster

Spiderman, Spiderman,
Does whatever a spider can
Spins a web, any size,
Catches thieves just like flies
Look Out!
Here comes the Spiderman.

Is he strong?
Listen bud,
He’s got radioactive blood.
Can he swing from a thread
Take a look overhead
Hey, there
There goes the Spiderman.

In the chill of night
At the scene of a crime
Like a streak of light
He arrives just in time.

Spiderman, Spiderman
Friendly neighborhood Spiderman
Wealth and fame
He’s ignored
Action is his reward.

To him, life is a great big bang up
Whenever there’s a hang up
You’ll find the Spider man.

I think we must all know the iconic theme tune from the tv series adaptation of the Marvel comics " Spiderman "
When I was a child, the thought of being like him capable of crawling up buildings at will certainly was a great fantasy !! Science has addressed this incredible possibility and by studying the surface of the feet of a " Gecko " at nano-molecular level this till now illusive fantasy has become reality in our collective present, the implications make the mind boggle as it will allow human beings to go to places they could not have dreamed of before !!

It would seem that this amazing little lizard known as the " Gecko " or " Hemidactylus frenatus " is doted with an incredible adaptation on the surface on the palms of its feet !!

A gecko's toe,s has a microscopic hierarchical structure of stalk-like setae - 100 microns in length, 2 microns in radius.
From these individual setae, are to be found hundreds of terminal tips called spatulae - approximately 200 nanometers in diameter at their widest - they branch out and contact the climbing surface.These hairs create an electrostatic force known as Van de Waals.
Taken from Wikepedia > " In physical chemistry, the van der Waals forces (or van der Waals interaction), named after Dutch scientist Johannes Diderik van der Waals, are the residual attractive or repulsive forces between molecules or atomic groups that do not arise from covalent bonds, nor ionic bonds.[1] It can be shown that van der Waals forces are of the same origin as the Casimir effect, arising from quantum interactions with the zero-point field.[2] The resulting van der Waals forces can be attractive or repulsive. "

For those of you that would like to look closer into this incredible molecular phenomenon here is a good link which explains in more detail the principle. http://www.chemguide.co.uk/atoms/bonding/vdw.html

But in short this electrostatic process causes all neighboring molecules to be attracted to each other when placed in proximity to the gecko,s touch !! So more simply put the feet of the Gecko are able to literally " magnetically stick " to any surface. A Gecko can hang from the ceiling from just one of its finger tips, if its feels the need and a clear advantage to do so!!
Pretty impressive eh ?

The US Military who have quickly seen the clear advantage of such technology in the battle field, have been financing research carried out by Stanford University under the guidance of Dr Eliiot Hawkes who now reports a total success in his research, saying in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface:

'A human of mass 70 kilograms (11 stone) successfully ascended a 3.6-meter (11 ft) vertical glass wall with 140 square centimeters of gecko-inspired dry adhesives in each hand.

'We tested hundreds of individual steps on glass with the 70kg (11 stone) climber and 140 square centimeters of adhesive without failure.

'The synthetic adhesion system creates a nearly uniform load distribution across the whole adhesive area, improving upon the adhesive-bearing structures of a gecko's toe and enabling a human to climb vertical glass using an area of adhesive no larger than the area of a human hand.'

Here is the video showing use of this revolutionary material allowing a man climb up a polished mirror !

This beautiful creature, veritable miracle of evolution and nature the Gecko " are extremely abundant on my island of La Gomera, but its fast and extremely timid, so getting near one, or ever touching one feels , well like a miracle too,
But it happened the other day as my Russian friend here managed " somehow " to get one on his finger of all things and I was lucky enough to picture it for your eyes only here in this community of crypto steem wall walkers )

How beautiful is that Steemers? )