1. CATGUT MEEN3344 By Mark Benavides

2. What is Catgut? Catgut is a material made primarily from the intestinal fibers of sheep and goat. The name is a portmanteau derived from Cattle Gut It is made by taking the entrails of a recently killed sheep and applying a cleaning and soaking process Catgut is not from cats! Catgut wire

3. Uses for Catgut Catgut was once the primary material for bowed and stringed instruments such as violins and guitars. It can also used for tennis rackets Its was used for these applications due to the nature of the intestine itself. The intestine has to withstand contraction and expansion constantly which makes for a material that can withstand a lot of tension. This is ideal as stringed instruments operate under high tension for extended period of time

4. Creation/Manufacture Catgut is created by cleaning excess fats from the intestines and soaking for an extended period of time Once the soaking process is done, the instestine is then stretched and twisted to form elongated strings The final process entails bleaching, drying then coating with olive oil

5. Catgut 2012 Today catgut can mostly be found in medical applications such as for stitching sutures because of its dissolvability into wounds. Catgut is still used in some high end tennis rackets Some violin players still prefer catgut to steel strings due to tone, but guitarists have mostly moved on due to the intonation problems associated with catgut.

6. Modern Day Alternatives Stringed instruments primarily use steel strings wound with nickel nowadays as they alleviate the intonation problems associated with Catgut Classical guitars today primarily use nylon strings as they the tuning is more stable due to the material being less affect by changes in temperature In medical applications, catgut is also being slowly phased out in favor of synthetics due to studies being shown that wounds treated with catgut can sustain an infection

7. Sources and References http://www.professorstring.com/cat_gut.php#.UL4suk9XPBM http://www.tennis-warehouse.com/lc/naturalgut.html http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_0K70sLCgQbE/SYB0_rwq3CI/AAAAAAAAAtI/bs _xy21nP0Y/s400/oakie02.jpg http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_0K70sLCgQbE/SYB0_rwq3CI/AAAAAAAAAtI/bs _xy21nP0Y/s400/oakie02.jpg http://www.maestros-of-the-guitar.com/classicalguitarstrings.html http://healthcert.com.au/_blog/Product_of_the_Month/post/Catgut_Su tures-_A_Timeless_Classic_or_A_Thing_Of_The_Past/ http://healthcert.com.au/_blog/Product_of_the_Month/post/Catgut_Su tures-_A_Timeless_Classic_or_A_Thing_Of_The_Past/ http://img.gawkerassets.com/img/17fin62tx7wdtjpg/original.jpg http://cdn.bleacherreport.net/images_root/slides/photos/002/647/689 /cat-gut-john-channing_display_image.jpg?1349361630 http://cdn.bleacherreport.net/images_root/slides/photos/002/647/689 /cat-gut-john-channing_display_image.jpg?1349361630 http://healthcert.com.au/Images/Sutures-In-Use-01.jpg