Composites Design and Manufacture (Plymouth University teaching support materials) Biomimetics

Lecture PowerPoint

Review papers

Subject Index

The Biomimetics Network for Industrial Sustainability (BioNIS) defines biomimetics as design inspired by nature - an enabling discipline which looks towards nature for ideas that may be adapted and adopted for solving problems.  Vincent has set up a wiki dedicated to the development of an ontology of biomimetics.  The Biomimicry Institute launched Ask Nature as a biomimicry design web portal - the world's first digital library of Nature's solutions, organized by function, to serve as an educational and cross-pollinating tool and encourage collaboration between biologists, engineers, designers and other innovators.  The key organisations/resources are:

• Biomimetics Network for Industrial Sustainability
• Biomimicry Institute  Ask Nature
• International Society of Bionic Engineering
• The Bionic Digital Library (requires LogIn)

In May 2011, representatives from Germany proposed that ISO (the International Organisation for standards) form a Technical Committee to consider the international standardisation of biomimetic techniques, methods and approaches [1].  In October 2012, the proposal was accepted and ISO/TC 266 set up with three Working Groups. In May 2013, the TC structure was extended to include WG4 as suggested by the Japanese contingent.:

• WG 1: definitions and differentiation from conventional methods and products (based on the VDI document 6220)
• draft international standard DIS 18458 [2] released in April 2014,
• WG 2: biomimetic materials, structures and components (based on VDI document 6223)
• committee draft 18457 released in june 2014,
• WG 3: biomimetic optimisation methods (based on VDI document 6224 parts 1 and 2)
• draft international standard 18459 [3] released in April 2014, and
• WG4: development of a knowledge infrastructure for biomimetics.

Salustri and Hoeller presented a working draft for a Biomimetic Assessment Framework at the ISO/TC 266 annual meeting during October 2015 in Kyoto.

Ecomimetics extends the concept of biomimetics to inspiration by and understanding of the wisdom of the ecosystem.

References

1. T Mead and N Hoeller, The ISO/TC266 Biomimetics Standard initiative, Zygote Quartely, 2014, 3, 72-83.
2. BS ISO 18458. Biomimetics. Terminology, concepts and methodology, 2014.
3. BS ISO 18459. Biomimetics. Biomimetic structural optimization, 2014.

Synapse by Biomimicry 3.8   case studies (to buy!)

Technological areas where biomimetics are applied include:

Antifouling

• Emily Ralston and Geoffrey Swain, Bioinspiration - the solution for biofouling control?, Bioinspiration & Biomimetics, 1 March 2009, 4(1), 015007 (9 pp).
• Shark inspired non-toxic coatings for non-fouling marine applications (University of Florida Brennan Research Group, 4 October 2006.
• Sharklet surfaces provide bacterial inhibition through a distinct pattern of millions of tiny features that mimic the microbe-resistant properties of sharkskin and inhibit bacterial survival, migration and transfer through texture alone.  The technology is available to OEMs for the enhancement of the surfaces of products and medical devices.

Composites manufacture

• Festo 3D Cocooner spins glass fibre in UV curing resin into 3D lattice structures.

Drag reduction and antifouling

• FastSkin swimsuits reduce drag by mimicking shark skin (Pelagic Shark Research Foundation)
• VV Pavlov, Dolphin skin as a natural anisotropic compliant wall, Bioinspiration and Biomimetics, 2006, 1(1), 31-40.
• V Pavlov, D Riedeberger, U Rist and U Siebert, 2012. Analysis of the Relation between Skin Morphology and Local Flow Conditions for a Fast-Swimming Dolphin. In: Nature-Inspired Fluid Mechanics, eds. C. Tropea, H. Bleckmann. Springer, Berlin/Heidelberg, 2012, 239-253. doi:
• L Wen, JC Weaver, PJM Thornycroft and George V Lauder, Hydrodynamic function of biomimetic shark skin: effect of denticle pattern and spacing, Bioinspiration & Biomimetics, 2015, 10(6), 066010.
• DaimlerChrysler Benz DCX Bionics car, and longer version from Composites News Supersite
• "Gone fishin': Mercedes-Benz engineers took a few dips in their search for the perfect model for their Bionic Car, Daimler Chrysler Hightech Report 2/2005.
• NASA Langley Research Center improved aeroplane fuel efficiency by reducing the drag arising from friction of turbulent airflow over the aeroplane surfaces using V-shaped and angled grooves (no deeper than a scratch) in the direction of the airflow. This technology offers similar advantages for vessels moving through water as demonstrated when Stars and Stripes recatured the America's cup in 1987.
  NASA riblets for Stars & Stripes, NASA Langley Research Centre fact sheet NF203, October 1993.
• Airbus Germany undertook experiments with a self-adhesive foil designed to mimic shark skin and tested in the 1990s on the A340 passenger aircraft. Fine grooves on the surface decreased air resistance sufficiently to reduce fuel consumption by about 3%.  However, the gains "were cancelled out by two factors. First, maintenance costs for the foil were too high, and second, it was too heavy". [Kristina Patschull, Bionics, Deutschland Online, 13 May 2005].
• Lufthansa Technik and BASF have jointly developed AeroSHARK surface technology which replicates the flow-efficient properties of shark skin.  A Swiss International Air Lines (SWISS) Boeing 777-300ER, registered HB-JNH, has been fitted with 950 square meters of the "Riblet" films over the fuselage and engine nacelles. AeroSHARK reduces the aircraft outer skin frictional resistance by >!%, according to the calculations and flow simulations. Fuel consumption, and consequent CO₂ emissions are reduced by the same order of magnitude leading to annual savings of around 400 tons of kerosene and more than 1,200 tons of carbon dioxide. The first passenger flight of the aircraft was on 25 November 2022 [Lusthansa/BAST press release, 25 November 2022.].

Goethite nanofibres fibre in limpet teeth

1. L Asfa-Wossen, Limpet teeth bite back, Materials World, April 2016,2494), 33-35. Online access limited to IOM3 members.

Lotus effect

• The Lotus effect (ThinkQuest)
• Comparison between hydrophobic structured and smooth surfaces
• William Thielicke, Bionik  1.6MB animated gif  1.6MB avi file  3.04MB avi file  3.1MB avi file
• Satoshi Osawa, Masaki Yabe, Makiko Miyamura and Katsumi Mizuno,
  Preparation of super-hydrophobic surface on biodegradable polymer by transcribing microscopic pattern of water-repellent leaf,
  Polymer, 17 May 2006, 47(11), 3711-3714.

Nano Air Vehicle mimicking a maple seed

• Nano Air Vehicle Floats Like Maple Seed (Technovelgy.com)

µMist™ spray technology for nebulisers, needle-free injections, fire extinguishers and fuel injection systems

• Beetles Inspire a New Generation of Technology, EPSRC PN: 51/07, 26 September 2007

Mouldboard plough

• Luquan Ren, Shiqiao Deng, Jingchun Wang and Zhiwu Han, Design principles of the non-smooth surface of bionic plow moldboard, Journal of Bionics Engineering, March 2004, 1(1), 9-19.
• Li Jian-Qiao, Sun Jiu-Rong, Ren Lu-Quan and Chen Bing-cong, Sliding resistance of plates with bionic bumpy surface against soil, Journal of Bionics Engineering, December 2004, 1(4), 207-214.
• Deng Shi-Qiao, Ren Lu-Quan, Liu Yan and Han Zhi-wu, Tangent resistance of soil on moldboard and the mechanism of resistance reduction of bionic moldboard, Journal of Bionics Engineering, March 2005, 2(1), 33-46.

Brinker Technology  Platelet Technology^TM for pipeline sealing  (company dissolved 2016).

• Videos
• animation
• the technology
• Yorkshire Water
• Scottish Water
• Pipeline leak-sealing technology, Ingenia, June 2006, (27), 18.
• Klaire Evans, Sealing solutions, Ingenia, December 2006, (29), 41-45.

Propellers and yacht masts

• A team at the University of Southampton studied feather shafts and found they were made of a multi-layered fibrous composite material which allows the feather to bend and twist to cope with the stresses of flight.  They foresee applications of their findings in yacht masts and propeller blades [1].

Reference

1. Bird feathers similar to carbon fibre, Reinforced Plastics, March–April 2015, 59(2), 78–79.

Soft robot gripper

• A spiraling robotic gripper 'twines' like a plant, 29 December 2020.
• M Yang, LP Cooper, N Liu, X Wang and MP Fok, Twining plant inspired pneumatic soft robotic spiral gripper with a fiber optic twisting sensor, Optics Express, 2020, 28(23), 35158-35167.

Temperature control

• Patrick Bellew, Going underground (thermal mass energy storage systems by analogy with termite nests), Ingenia, 2006, 28, 41-46.
• 'Smart-fabric' which adapts to changing temperatures, inspired by pine cones (GizMag)

Velcro and gecko tape

• Velcro
• Gecko tape (NewScientist.com)
• Gecko-Inspired High-Friction Micro-Fibres (NetComposites, 25 August 2006).
• Fabian Acker, Synthetic Gecko, Ingenia, March 2007, (30), 38-42.

Others

• Airbus "Bird of Prey" hybrid-electric, turbo-propeller concept aircraft for regional air transportation, AeroSpace and Defense (ASD) News, 19 July 2019.
• Artificial cricket hairs to help deaf people, Roland Piquepaille's Technology Trends, 21 June 2005.
• Biomineralisation as a route to composites repair, University of Delaware Center for Composite Materials, 21 February 2006.
• Carbon fibre pavilion based on beetle shells, University of Stuttgart, circa 2014.
• Composite material inspired by shrimp stronger than standard used in airplane frames, Multimech, accessed 29 April 2014.
• CS Haines, MD Lima, N Li, GM Spinks, J Foroughi, JDW Madden, SH Kim, S Fang, M Jung de Andrade, F Göktepe, Ö Göktepe, SM Mirvakili, S Naficy, X Lepró, J Oh, ME Kozlov, SJ Kim, X Xu, BJ Swedlove, GG Wallace and RH Baughman, Artificial muscles from fishing line and sewing thread, Science, 21 February 2014, 343(6173), 868-872.
• FT Malik, RM Clement, DT Gethin, W Krawszik and AR Parker, Nature's moisture harvesters: a comparative review, Bioinspiration & Biomimetics, 2014, 9(3), 031002.

Recommended reading:

• Yoseph Bar-Cohen (editor), Biomimetics: Biologically Inspired Technologies,
  Taylor and Francis/CRC Press, 2005.  ISBN: 0-849331-63-3.  PU CSH Library
• Janine M Benyus, Biomimicry - Innovation Inspired by Nature,
  Perennial (HarperCollins), New York, 1997.  ISBN 0-06-053322-6.  PU CSH Library
• Peter Forbes, The gecko's foot: bio-inspiration - engineered from nature,
  Fourth Estate (HarperCollins), London, 2005.  ISBN 0-00-717990-1.  PU CSH Library
• Robert Frenay, Pulse: How Nature Is Inspiring the Technology of the 21st Century,
  Little-Brown, December 2006. ISBN-13: 978-0316640510.
• Ashok K Goel, Daniel A McAdams, Robert B Stone (editors), Biologically Inspired Design: computational methods and tools,
  Springer, 2014.  E-book: ISBN 978-1-4471-5248-4.  Hardcover: ISBN 978-1-4471-5247-7.
• Petra Gruber, D Bruckner, C Hellmich, H-B Schmiedmayer, H Stachelberger and IC Gebeshuber (editors)
  Biomimetics: materials, structures and processes - examples, ideas and case studies
  Springer, 2011.  ISBN 978-3-642-11933-0.
• Mike Hansell, Built by Animals: The Natural History of Animal Architecture,
  Oxford University Press, Oxford, 18 October 2007. ISBN-13: 978-0-19-920556-1.
• Jay Harman, The Shark's Paintbrush: biomimicry and how nature is inspiring innovation,
  Nicholas Brearley Publishing, 2013. ISBN 978-1-85788-604-4.
• Paul Hawken, AB Lovins and LH Lovins, Natural Capitalism - The Next Industrial Revolution,
  Earthscan Publications, London, 1999.  ISBN 1-85383-461-0.  tenth edition: ISBN 978-1-84407-170-8.  PU CSH Library
• Esmaiel Jabbari, Deok-Ho Kim, Luke P Lee, Amir Ghaemmaghami and Ali Khademhosseini (editors),
  Handbook of Biomimetics and Bioinspiration: biologically-driven engineering of materials, processes, devices and systems (three volumes),
  World Scientific, Singapore,2016.  ISBN: 978-981-4354-92-9.
• Philip Nelson, Biological Physics: energy, information, life (updated first edition),
  WH Freeman, 2008. ISBN-13: 978-0-716-79897-2
• EYK Ng and Y Luo, Bio-inspired surfaces and applications,
  World Scientific, Singapore, 2016. ISBN: 978-981-4704-48-9.
• Peter Pearce, Structure in Nature is a Strategy for Design,
  MIT Press, Cambridge MA & London, 1978.  ISBN 0-262-16064-1.
• Luquan Ren, 仿生学导论 (The Introduction of Bionics .. in Chinese), Science Press, 27 September 2016, ISBN 978-7-03-050099-1.
• FE Round, RM Crawford and DG Mann, The diatoms: biology & morphology of the genera,
  Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1990. ISBN 0-521-36318-7.  ISBN-13: 978-0-521-71469-3.  PU CSH Library
  Detailed electron microscope images to make any nanotechnologist green with envy!
• Chris Smith (editor), Biomimetics: technology transfer from biology to engineering,
  Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, 15 February 2002, 360(1791).
• Bharat Bhushan (editor), Biomimetics I: functional surfaces,
  Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, 28 April 2009, 367(1893).
• Bharat Bhushan (editor), Biomimetics II: fabrication and applications,
  
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, 13 May 2009, 367(1894).
• D’Arcy Wentworth Thompson (edited by John Tyler Bonner), On growth and form,
  Cambridge University Press, c1961. ISBN 0-521-06623-9.  PU CSH Library
• JFV Vincent, Structural Biomaterials (revised edition)
  Princeton University Press, August 1990. ISBN-10: 0691025134. ISBN-13: 978-0691025131.  Third edition: ISBN 978-0-6911-5400-8.  PU CSH Library.
• JFV Vincent, OA Bogatyreva, NR Bogatyrev, A Bowyer and A-K Pahl, Biomimetics: its practice and theory,
  Journal of the Royal Society of London - Interface, 22 August 2006, 3(9), 471-482.
• Steven Vogel  Comparative Biomechanics - Life's Physical World,
  Princeton University Press, Princeton and Oxford, 2003.  ISBN 0-691-11297-5.  PU CSH Library.
• Yongmei Zheng, Bio-inspired Wettability surfaces: developments in micro- and nanostructures,
  Pan Stanford Publishing, 2015. ISBN 978-981-4463-60-7.
• Zygote Quarterly 18 special edition covering some of the material presented at the NASA Biomimicry Summit and Education Forum ​held 02-04 August 2016.

or for some shorter items, see:

• Biomimicry (Janine Benyus)
• Biomimicry (CBC .. seventh interactive feature)
• Biomimicry Institute
• What is biomimetics ? (University of Bath)
• What is biomimetics ? (University of Reading)
• BIOMIME (Swedish Center for Biomimetic Fiber Engineering)
• Biologically-Inspired Product Development (University of Maryland)
• Eco-efficiency at every step of the aircraft life-cycle: biomimicry (Airbus)
• Carlo Menon, European Space Agency Advanced Concept Team (ESA ACT) on biomimetics, 23 January 2006 including 5 minute Podcast
  • BIONICS2SPACE ! Bionics & Space System Design  with options to search the Bionics Systems database or Knowledge map database
• "Nature's Wisdom", 2005 World Exposition, Aichi - Japan, 25 March to 25 September 2005.
• Richard Bonser, A design for life, Materials World, April 2005, 13(4), 21.
• Luke Hutson, Go forth, and multiply, Materials World, April 2005, 13(4), 22-24.
• David R Butcher, Engineers Look to Nature for Inspiring New Tricks, ThomasNet.com Industrial Market Trends, 19 July 2006.
• Rudy Koopmans, Back to nature, Materials World, October 2007, 15(10), 30-31.
• Fran Kurk and Curt McNamara (edited by Theresa Gaffey), Better by Design - An Innovation Guide: Using Natural Design Solutions, Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, 2005/06  (2.08 MB PDF file).
• Tom Mueller, Biomimetics: Design by Nature, National Geographic, April 2008.
• Kristina Patschull, Bionics, Deutschland Online, 13 May 2005.
• Kate Ravilious, Borrowing from nature's best ideas - from super-advanced glue to shimmering lipstick, the simplest living things are providing the inspiration for futuristic materials, Guardian Unlimited, 31 July 2007.
• Ian Salusbury, Bone in contention,  Materials World, April 2005, 13(4), 25-27.
• KH Sandhage et al, Merging biological self-assembly with synthetic chemical tailoring: the potential for 3-D genetically engineered micro/nano-devices (3-D GEMS), International Journal of Applied Ceramic Technology, 2005, 2(4), 317-326. "Technology that imitates nature", The Economist, 9 June 2005.