Even Jewish mothers cannot match the Stegodyphus lineatus when it comes to feeding the children.

Israeli scientists have just discovered that this spider, found in the Negev desert, dissolves its own body and turns the resulting liquid into food for its young.

Researchers already knew that this species and some others feed themselves to their young. But they have now observed that the self-sacrificial Stegodyphus prepares its body for consumption as soon as its offspring have hatched.

"What is new here is the understanding about the liquefaction of the intestines and the gut," said Yael Lubin, the Ben Gurion University professor who oversaw the research.

Dr Lubin said that a few weeks after the young hatch, they kill their mother to feast on her. She explained that they then "suck out almost her entire abdomen which has become liquid - they suck her dry leaving just the exoskeleton".

Doctoral student Mor Salomon conducted the research, which was published in the Journal of Arachnology. "This is the first demonstration of the mechanism underlying suicidal maternal care in an arthropod," Ms Salomon wrote.