Biomimicry comes from bios, meaning “life,” and mimesis, meaning “to imitate.”
It is a fairly new science that studies nature for ways to answer the needs of humans.
According to author and biomimicry expert Janine Benyus, nature has already invented many processes and products far superior to what humans have created.
Benyus says that animals, plants, and microbes are the “consummate engineers.”
They have discovered through trial and error what works and what doesn’t.
Most important, they have figured out what lasts.
Two examples of biomimicry are the airplane and the telephone.
The Wright brothers studied birds to learn how they fly.
Inventor Alexander Gramham Bell imitated the human tongue and eardrum to create his original telephone speaker and receiver.
Velcro is another famous example of biomimicry.
One summer day in 1948, Swiss inventor George de Mestral took his dog for a hike.
They both returned from their walk covered in burrs.
De Mestral studied one of the burrs under his microscope and discovered it was covered with tiny hooks.
The hooks grabbed the loops in the fabric of the clothing and stuck.
From studying the burrs, De Mestral got the idea to develop a hook and loop fastener made by nylon.
He called it Velcro, a combination of the words velour and crochet.
In 1955, he patented his design.
Today, of course, Velcro is a multimillion-dollar company.
Yet another example of a product conceived through biomimicry is a house paint called Lotusan.
This paint mimics the self-cleaning properties of the lotus flower’s leaves.
German botanist Dr. Wilhelm Barthlott discovered this process when he noticed that a lotus leaf is covered with tiny points.
When a speck of dirt lands on the leaf, it perches atop those points.
Then, as water flows over the leaf, it easily picks up the dirt and carries it away.
Lotusan is guaranteed to stay clean for five years without washing.
In the world of biomimicry, another major goal is to recreate spider silk.
This substance is five times as strong as steel, yet remains light and elastic.
Thus researchers are studying how spiders spin silk.
So far, they know only that spiders first eat and digest insects for protein.
Glands in the spider’s body then add water to the proteins to create a wet solution.
When the spider squirts this wet solution through a tiny opening, the soluble proteins turn into an insoluble fiber, a strand of silk.
This last step of the process is the secret scientists hope to be able to unlock and duplicate.