title: Untangling the spider's web.
abstract: The spider's orb web provides an excellent opportunity to study the decision rules of a highly complex orientation behaviour. The behaviour is inherited, and it has evolved from laying a single line to configuring the geometrical thread pattern of the orb. The possibility that the algorithms of orb web construction may have evolved convergently adds to the excitement of the experimental analysis. Analytical studies modelling the spider's rules of thread configuration might penetrate where descriptive studies of web design or construction behaviour perforce stop short.
authors.affiliation: Dept of Zoology, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3PS, UK.
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Vollrath