What is Biomimicry? We can learn a lot from our environment. Everything around us makes us think about new discoveries. we the human beings can learn a lot from animals.

Biomimicry

Biomimicry is learning from nature. It refers to the imitation of different models of nature to solve complex human problems. The term “biomimicry” is derived from ancient Greek. The word bios means life and the mimos mean actor. A very closely field to it is known as bionics.

All living things go through evolutionary changes in their structures and materials over the geological time and thus adopt very well according to natural selection. Being inspired by biological solutions at macro and nanoscales, we have developed many technologies. Biomimicry inspires us that whenever there is a problem in the environment, just have a look around. Nature is the key to all answers. Nature has helped us to solve different engineering problems such as self-healing abilities, resistance, self-assembly, hydrophobicity, environmental exposure tolerance and harnessing solar energy.

Types

There are three types of biomimicry that are as follows:

1.  Copying shapes and forms

2.  Imitating different biological processes e.g. photosynthesis in a leaf

3. Mimicking ecosystem e.g. building the nature inspired city

History

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) worked on flying machines. He used to observe the birds’ flight, especially their structures, how they fly and glide through the air and all that. He made different sketches while observing all the mechanisms. The Wright Brothers continued Leonardo’s work and succeeded in flying first aircraft in 1903. They were inspired by pigeon’s flight. The American biophysicist and polymath Otto Schmitt gave the idea of “biomimetics” in 1950. He tried to engineer a device that could propagate nerves while he was researching on nerves in squid. Actually, he wanted to make such devices which could copy the natural systems. A term similar to biomimicry, known as bionics, was coined by Jack E. Steele. He also gave the definition of bionics. Later on a meeting was taken place in 1963 in which Schmitt stated that let them consider what bionics really meant to be and what other words similar to it made sense  e.g. biomimetics to make better use of different scientific techniques. In 1969, Schmitt mentioned the biomimetics term in his papers for the very first time and then it was added to Webster’s dictionary in 1974. The term biomimicry came to light in 1982. Then it got popularity in a book named as “Biomimicry: innovation inspired by nature” in 1997.

 

 

Technologies /Applications

Biomimicry can be applied in the vast fields of life. There are numerous features that can be imitated because of the complexity of biological entities.

Locomation

Biorobots: Bionic-kangaroo jumps like a kangaroo, saves energy and uses it to move ahead. It’s just like a spring. Kamigami robots are made to copy the motion of the cockroach in faster running.

Bats and birds are imitated for designing aircraft wing and techniques of flight.

Architecture and construction

Termites can maintain constant temperature and humidity in their mounds in the environment of varying temperature (1.5 to 40 degree Celsius). On the principle of which human can make building designs by scanning the mounds and creating 3D images of them.

We can construct the bridges that can diagnose and repair themselves by using biomimetic principles. By looking at the arrangement of leaves in plants we can have a better idea about the collection of solar power.

Structural materials

The structural materials having light weight with great stiffness and strength are geatly needed in the developing world. We need a bulk amount of these highly complex structures with minimum costs that may serve in construction, energy storage and transportation. The complex natural materials span from nano to macro scales which makes them both strong and tough to replicate structures that will lead us to a more efficient and advanced technologies. The examples of the materials which are able to resist damages are bones, teeth, nacre, and bamboo. The nanoscale to macroscale structures and toughening mechanisms in a bone give it an exceptional tolerance. Nacre is a very hard and tough structure with a thick layer of minerals just like a brick and motar. It has a simpler structure with mechanical properties similar to that of a bone. In biomorphic mineralization, biostructures are used as templates for mineralization. We make materials that have similar structures to the biostructures. Spider web can be used in bulletproof vests (just like Kevlar), parachutes, bridge cables and artificial ligaments used in medicines. Different cutting tools have been made by copying self-sharpening teeth of different animals.

Inspiration from animals

Many microstructures can be found in the wings of morpho butterfly that produce some coloring effects through different phenomena of physics e.g. multilayer interference, diffraction, thin film interference and  scattering properties of wing structures. The same principle can be applied to the coloration of soap bubbles. These microstructures of butterfly wings can also be replicated by biomorphic mineralization or different sized microspheres of silica to help reaching similar optical properties.

Bullet train: bullet train is the fastest train in the world, the concept of which bases upon the biomimicry. It was discovered by imitating the king fisher bird’s movement through the air. The king fisher has a long beak which aids him in catching a fish from water with frictionless contact with water that produces no splashes in the air. In the initial debut of train, there was a big problem. Each time the train came out of the tunnel, it produced a sonic boom which used to develop noise in the environment just like a bomb blast. With the development of bullet train, we got rid of this problem. Bullet train uses 15 percent less energy and moves 10 percent faster than the old one.

Heliotrope copy the movement of the Sun: as the sunflower moves itself all the day following the movement of the sun, similarly, the heliotrope can be used to trace the movement of the Sun. heliotrope contains the artificial flowers which are silvery. In the centre, they have the LED bulbs that get energy from solar panels. The movement of flower petals is controlled by the pistons under the flowers which consume the alcohol and then evaporate it. Flowers open at night and closes at day time.

Treebot formation: This idea was given to assist the foresters in doing different tasks by climbing over them. Treebot has the tactile sensors which guide to find a tree and to climb over it. This innovation was collected from the inchworms as they can also climb over trees. It can carry loads up to the tree. Moreover, the tactile sensor movement is more efficient and easier than that of visual movement.

Bird safe glass: According to estimation, the transparent glass windows become a cause of almost 100 million birds death every year. They die because of not recognizing the transparent glass. To overcome this problem and make them safe, Ornilux Birdsafe Glass was manufactured being inspired by the spider’s web that contained the strands reflecting UV radiations. The birds can easily see this glass and they don’t die.  

Both Human and the birds take benefit from Ornilux Birdsafe Glass. Human become safe by stopping the UV radiations to come in the house from the window.

Surfaces

The movement through water can be improved by looking at the shark body shape and skin. The surfaces have the properties similar to that of shark skin can be manufactured. Researchers are making progress in surface tension biomimetics for making different technologies such as microactuators and hydrophobic or hydrophilic coatings.

Adhesion

Wet adhesion: An inspiration from the toe pads of tree, torrent frogs and arboreal salamanders leads us towards the formation of tire treads. Some amphibians have the ability to attach themselves on the wet surfaces. Their attachment is due to the mucous which is formed into the glands. The mucous glands are opened up into the channels between the epidermal cells. Even they can adhere themselves to the wet surfaced rocks while the water is flooding over the rocks.

Similarly, marine mussels can bind to the rocks and surfaces under the water. This makes them able not to be swept away by high speed water flow. Actually, this attachment to different surfaces (rocks, boats, natural surfaces) is due to the filaments. In all this process, the mussel foot proteins are involved. This all process inspires scientists and researchers to create copolyampholytes. Adhesive glue can also be gained from mussels.

Dry adhesion: beetles, flies, spiders, and lizards have attachment pads in their legs that make them able to stick to different surfaces. They can also move on vertical walls through their leg pads. They inspire us to develop climbing boots, robots, and tape.

Publisher name: Muhammad Hannan Sharif

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