BioInspired! So What? Now What!

2013/03/24 The San Diego Zoo Biomimicry website has moved to http://www.sandiegozoo.org/bioinspiration/, which is currently under construction.

The main page contains news on biomimicry as it relates to the San Diego Zoo, including updates on the recent 2011 Biomimicry Conference as well as a video of some of the conference highlights. 

"Here you can read all about the new interdisciplinary area of science called biomimetics (or bionics/biomimecry). 
Biomimetics is about developing new technology inspired by nature. On this site you can, apart from news about research and new technological progress in the field, also read about the history behind biomimetics and the success stories so far.

A new service of Nature Publishing, "Scitable brings together a library of scientific overviews with a worldwide community of scientists, researchers, teachers, and students."  In addition to promoting learning, it supports online collaboration, publishing of activities and portfolios, and maintenance of evidence-based online course packs.

The first topic included in Scitable is Genetics, broken down into:

"The Bionics Competence Network BIOKON is an association of the most important research groups in the field of bionics in Germany.

The Bionics Competence Network (BIOKON) hosts the 28 major players in the field of bionics and biomimetics in Germany. It is a federally funded project under the auspices of the Federal Ministry for Education and Research.

Includes:

• About biomimetics
  (what, origins, Reading Centre)
• Current projects
  

2012/02/23 added Additional Readings

This website contains a fascinating set of papers exploring how natural forces (sun, gravity, wind), rhythms and rituals can be creative elements in architectural design.  Although designing to a context is becoming increasingly popular, it is rare to see a body of work that is as well grounded on an understanding of natural forces and how they interact.   The papers suggest a number of different patterns that would be useful additions to an architect's toolkit. 

Traditionally biomimetics or biomimcry is the application of lessons from nature to engineering, product or architectural problems. There are some great examples that are used to explain the biomimetic approach such as the Eifel Tower and Velcro. And whilst these may be disputed by the purist they get across the idea that nature can help us think differently about the problems we face.

Recent work at the University of Bath has shown that there is much more to this approach that simply copying what nature does.  For example did you know that if you take a similarly sized problem that nature uses a significantly smaller amount of energy to ceate a solution?  Here biomimetics can be used as the basis for ‘green’ thinking and a robust basis for green management.

The latest in biomimetic research carried out at Bath shows that biomimetics can be used to help change the thinking of a leadership team so that they can come up with different and typically better, solutions.

An extensive post from 2004 on the history of biomimicry/biomimetics.  Sean Kennedy explores the research into spider silk as well as robotics based on cockroaches.  The post includes a number of references.

Thanks to Biomimicry: Nature as model, mentor and measure for the pointer!

"The first 30,000 pages have been unveiled of a vast encyclopedia which aims to catalogue every one of our planet's 1.8 million species.  The immense online resource is designed to greatly enhance our understanding of the world's diminishing biodiversity."

The Encyclopedia of Life (EOL) will cover all six kingdoms of life, including viruses and extinct species.  Goals include:

Kevin and Josh stack are ecological builders.  The site includes articles on