Artificial ligaments (ALs), as important grafts for reconstructing the anterior cruciate ligament, often fail in rupture owing to inadequate mechanical properties and frictional wear in clinical practice. Braiding parameters affect the properties of ALs. Previous studies have been limited to investigating the effects of braiding parameters on the mechanical or tribological properties of ALs in isolation and lacked a comprehensive investigation into their combined or synergistic impact. Therefore, in this study, ALs with different braiding parameters are prepared, and mechanical and tribological indicators are integrated to conduct a synergistic investigation. The results show that as the braiding angle and number of layers decrease, the breaking strain increases, while the ultimate tensile force, elastic modulus, and yield force decrease. The number of spindles positively correlates with the mechanical and tribological performance of ALs.

3D fibre aerogels with aligned architecture, due to their high porosity, interconnected pore structure and high specific surface area, show great potential in sound absorption, oil-water separation and air filtration. Herein, we present a novel and simple long straight bundle electrospinning strategy inspired by Darwin's bark spider to prepare 3D aligned fibre aerogels. Different from the conventional electrospinning, whipping instability of the fibre is effectively eliminated by manipulating the distribution of electric field lines during the long straight bundle electrospinning, resulting in the formation of a 3D aligned fibre aerogel. The detailed long straight bundle electrospinning process (formation of fibre bundle, flying path of fibre bundle and deposition of fibre bundle) along with the underlying mechanism are systematically studied. Based on this theoretical basis, scalable fabrication of the 3D flexible aligned fibre aerogel with an ultrahigh fibre alignment degree of 0.93 and an ultrathick structure (2.8 cm) is achieved in one step. As a proof of concept, we investigate the use of the 3D aligned fibre aerogel in air filtration. It is found that the fibre aerogel shows excellent PM_1.0 and PM_2.5 filtration performance in both perpendicular to and parallel to fibre alignment direction. Interestingly, the pressure drop in the direction parallel to fibre alignment is only 21 Pa, which is much lower than that in the direction perpendicular to fibre alignment. We also compare the filtration performance of our 3D fibre aerogel with other filters and find that the comprehensive performance of our aerogel is obviously better.

Finger pad strain governs grip control and tactile feedback, yet in vivo measurements during sliding remain scarce. This feasibility study utilised 3D-digital image correlation (3D-DIC) and optical coherence tomography (OCT) for quantifying surface strains and subsurface deformation in a human finger pad during static/dynamic glass contact, linking both to the respective friction behaviour. Principal strains increase systematically with normal load (0.5-3 N), concentrating at the mechanoreceptor-rich fingertip under dynamic sliding (peak ε₁ 2%-7.5%). Friction (CoF 0.4-0.8) and apparent contact area follow load-dependent power laws, with adhesion dominating. Multiscale imaging validates surface strain as a reliable friction predictor, providing good proof-of-concept for strain-based human finger pad friction modelling despite subsurface measurement limitations.