Weevils evolved nut-and-screw joint

Mother Nature beat hardware stores by millions of years

Back when hardware meant bony plates and flesh-rending teeth, a living version of the humble screw evolved naturally in, of all places, the leg joints of weevils.

HOW HIP A scanning electron micrograph of the tapering top of a weevil’s leg shows a curved ridge that functions like the thread on a biological screw, another mechanical marvel that evolved long before humans invented it.