A team of scientists from South Korea has imitated the design of a spider's leg to build a sensor that can detect tiny vibrations.

Their study was published in Nature this week.

Wandering spiders have an exceptional ability to sense faint, nanoscale tremors metres away. They use this super-sensory ability to communicate with potential mates by tapping leaves and 'listening' out for the minuscule shuffling of other spiders.

"The vibration sensor of the spider combines a number of exquisite properties. It's extremely sensitive but it's also extremely discriminatory," Professor Peter Fratzl told Nature Podcast. Fratzl's paper on wandering spiders was what first inspired the team's research.

The scientists mimicked the structure of the lyriform organ in the spider's leg to achieve a similar level of sensitivity.

"Spiders sense extremely small variations in mechanical stress using crack-shaped slit organs near their leg joints," the team explained. "Sensors based on nanoscale crack junctions and inspired by the geometry of a spider's slit organ can [also] attain ultra-high sensitivity."

These zip-like junctions were produced by layering metal platinum and a flexible polymer to create parallel slits.

"Initially we failed many times," study leader Professor Mansoo Choi told BBC News reporter Jonathan Webb.

"It took several months… but finally we worked out how ultra-high sensitivity could be derived from a controlled crack formation."

The detector was so precise it could even sense the simulated vibrations of a ladybird's wings.

The researchers say that their detector will have a broad range of applications in speech pattern recognition and in detecting physiological signals.

Source: BBC News