Biomimetic Design is defined as the replication of models, systems, and elements of nature for the purpose of solving complex social challenges. The conceptual vision for designing biomimetic structures is connected to the idea of intelligent and responsive synthetic ecosystems. By carefully examining Earth’s natural enviornments we can gain insight into the most optimal design principles.
Companies like Arconic have collaborated with designers, engineers and futurists to envision the future of Aerospace, Cities, Space travel and materials science. The former CEO of Arconic said that urban structures in the near future won’t feel like something that is humanly created, but insead will feel organic as if they were grown from the surrounding environment. He is describing biomimetic architecture, which can be understood as biologically inspired systems.
Many top architects, designers and urban planners believe that when we look to cities in the future we will see fewer of the rectangular geometries of current skyscrapers and buildings. The reason for this goes far beyond building more unique and aesthetically pleasing designs, but actually has to do with long term eco-sustainability. Zaha hadid architects have pioneered the use of parametric and Biomimetic design principles in their architectural endeavors. They have not only created a design style of fluidity and movement, but have also innovated with energy reduction, and overall greater levels of sustainability. If we conceptualize the “City” as a kind of self organizing complex system built from integrated layers, then we can make a comparison between the “city” and the “human body”. The human body for example, requires a constant supply of blood flow to circulate throughout the cardiovascular system. When there's a clot or a disturbance to this flow, negative effects like heart attack and stroke may occur.
Let us consider for a moment the traffic infrastructure in a major city. Using a biomimetic framework, we'll consider the analogy of highways being the veins of the city while the cars are the blood cells, from this perspective most cities in the world are actually dying. Traffic congestion affects every single major city on earth, because the volume of vehicles is increasing at a higher rate than the infrastructure can accommodate. I believe that we can make our infrastructures more efficient in the future by adopting a biomimetic design framework as we look to nature for new approaches to these challenges.
Elon Musk's “Boring” company has taken this approach to solving traffic congestion in Los Angeles by building a network of 3D tunnels under the city. They hope to create a faster transportation infrastructure capable of alleviating congestion on the surface. This concept is similar to how some animal species in nature build tunnels and habitats underground as a means of security and transportation. By also incorporating advanced nanotechnologies and new materials, building can be made stronger, lighter and more eco-sustainable in the near future. A primary goal of Biomimietcs is to use the concepts of nature to design intelligent and synthetic ecosystems by taking an organic approach to systems design.
Biomimetic design concepts can also be applied to making existing technologies orders of magnitude more efficient. What could the future of aerospace or naval design look like?
Using Biomimetics designers can build more aerodynamic airplanes and more hydrodynamic ships through biomimicry, simply by studying the animal species that have already mastered these elements. Airplanes today are essentially nothing more than hollow tubes, with wings attached and mostly uncomfortable seats on the interior.
What if airplanes in the future were more like flying wings with optimal efficiency based on triangular geometries? The interior volume of Hybrid Wing-Body airplanes would be more spacious and comfortable for passengers, which would increase the overall travel experience. The same concept can be applied to ships, by studying the curvilinear form of dolphins or sculptural elegance of sting-rays, aquatic vessels could become more hydrodynamic structures. I believe that Biomimetic design will play a key role in solving our greatest technological, social and environmental challenges.
Nearly every major challenge that humanity is trying to solve, nature has already mastered through billions of years of evolution. How do you convert sunlight to energy for plants, photosynthesis? How do you power a solar system, nuclear fusion from stars? How do flowers form such perfect spiral patterns, through mathematical codes like the fibonacci sequence. The dream of Biomimetic Design is to use patterns and formulas from the book of nature to design a smarter and more eco-sustainable society.
Nolan JT Nahar
Futurist
Evolutionary Cyberneticist
Digital Philosopher
2021
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