1. Welcome to:
Biomimicry- Using nature to inspire
sustainable design in science class
Friday 9:00 - 11:00
Presenter: Dan Gross
dgross242@live.com

2. Goals
 Connections: meet each other
 Adjust Agenda for this session to meet everyone’s
needs
 Introducing Biomimicry to students
 Out of your seat biomimicry activities
 Biomimicry PBL explanation
 Links on the web/and my website
 If there is time: Design your own sustainable
invention inspired by nature

3. Connections
 Any background you want to share
 Experience with biomimicry
 What you want out of this session
Sipping through a foot, the thorny devil lizard of the arid Australian desert
demonstrates its ability to wick water to its mouth via channels between its scales.
Scientists hope to mimic the mechanism to develop water-capture technologies for
dry regions.

4. Inspirations
 Earthwatch Institute
 William
McDonough
How could a tree inspire design?
 Janine Benyus
 Thomas Freidman
Preparing students for the 21st century
 Nature

5. Introducing biomimicry to your
students

6. On your Do-Now paper……..
 1. What do you think is the most creative piece of
technology ever?
 2. What human problem does this piece of technology
solve?
 3. What problem do you think inspired the
development of this technology?

7. What do these have in common?
Older students: How does nature inspire technology?
Location: Sahara Desert Location: city in a desert
Termite Mound Largest building in Zimbabwe
. Can be millions of termites in 1 mound Energy Design Challenge:
. Termites never sleep Keeping the Building cool without
. Used to be used to find gold wasting a lot of electricity
. Side note: Chance to share wonder of
natural world
Hypothesis ________________________________________________________________

8. Temp: constant 87 deg Base of the chamber is cool wet mud that
has openings that redirects air up.
even though outside temp.
Constantly build new vents and close old
ranges from 100-40 deg in ones to regulate temperature.
1 day
Explanation ____________________________________________________________
Building designers saved A/C energy by opening/closing
vents and storing cold air.

10. What do these have in common?
40-50 ft long Design Challenge: Harness the most
energy possible from well designed
Up to 80,000 pounds
blades
Max load of an 18 wheeler
Hypothesis: _______________________________
Eat Krill 2” long
_________________________________________

11. VS.
Which is more efficient?
8% improvement in lift
32 % reduction in drag
Explanation:
Ridges on the edges of windmill blades, like ridges on a whale fin, create more
power with less drag and more lift

12. Tangent
 “When you step into the intersection of
different fields/disciplines/cultures, you can
combine existing concepts into a large number
of extraordinary new ideas.”
- Frans Johansson “The Medici Effect”

13. What do these have in common?
Shark skin Boat Keel
. Non-Smooth Skin Design Challenge: Marine life grows on keel
. Sharks are self- cleaning Marine life on keel =
Skin does not collect marine slower speed
life
chemicals needed to clean
Hypothesis ________________________________________________________________

14. How can designers use shark skin design on a
keel to keep marine life off…….
Sharkskin Paint- with scale-like
texture
. 4-5 knots self cleaning
. 67% reduction marine life on
keel
Explanation:
Paint is scaly and allows water to get in-between scales to push off marine life.

15. What do all of these examples have
in common?
 Biomimicry:
 Break down the word
 Bio- life
 Mimicry- imitate
 Definition: Developing sustainable technologies inspired by nature
 Sustainable:
 How do you define sustainable?
 Lasts a long time/reusable
 Less harmful
 Uses less resources like energy
 Why it works: life has been adapting to earth for 3.8 billion years, we
have a lot we can learn from life on earth

16. Activities to get students thinking
like a sustainable designer inspired
by nature
 Read your card to yourself
 Find your match: picture and description
 Example: card card
more fuel efficient car
 Match up nature’s solution with design challenge
 Example nature’s solution design challenge
box fish more fuel efficient car
Figure out how nature can inspire the solution to the design challenge

17. PBL
Short video
Pass out PBL
Emphasis on Sustainability

18. Putting your creativity to the test…
Existing Example of Biomimicry
 a. identify the part of nature in your picture
 b. identify the technology in the picture
 Read the explanation under the photo.
 c. explain how “nature” inspired the
technology on your sheet
 d. what is the purpose of the technology?
 e. Why is the technology sustainable.

19. Examples of completed
Student
Projects
with different levels of application
drawings made on Smartboard
program

20. Fennec Fox
Hot air leaves
here.
Fur reflects the
heat to keep
the animal cool.
The Fennec Fox has reflective fur that keeps it
cool. It’s big ears act like a vent for hot air to
escape its body.

21. A “Cool” Ride
This is the
reflective
paint.
Cool air enters
the car here.
Heat leaves the car.
This car (shown above) has reflective, non-toxic paint
so it reflects light. It also has air vents so that cool air
comes in and it pushes the hot air out. This lowers the
use of air conditioning and stops people from cutting
down trees for money.

22. Fire resistant
 House off ground
 Houses off the ground where wild fire are
 Sand pine
frequent so it doesn’t catch house on fire
 High off the ground as easy. If the support beams are made
so it doesn’t catch on out of concrete it is sustainable and can
fire so easily.
be used over and over again.
 fire

23. Biomimicry – scented chemical hair
Reticulated giraffe Bottle/jar with chemicals in it
 This giraffe has hair that has •This is a possible jar filled with the
scented chemicals which repel chemicals which repel insects, dirt,
insects, ticks, dirt, and microorganisms, and ticks. It is easy
microorganisms.
to make and will help protect people
 These chemicals are made with local
materials using simple ingredients from various diseases such as lime
found within the organism, created disease and malaria. It can also
at room temperature, and produced prevent things from getting dirty.
on an as-needed basis
•From studying the giraffe’s hair we
Our invention is sustainable because all can watch the process of how the
of the ingredients in it are non-toxic and chemicals are made and mix together.
fairly common. After that, it is a simple matter of
making an artificial version.

24. Reticulated Giraffe giraffe might
The reticulated

 The reticulated giraffe is very inspire innovation in paint
interesting. Its hair contains manufactures to protect the coat
scented chemicals that repel ticks, and finishes. This invention will
insects, microorganisms and even also takeaway insects from your
dirt. house and dirt.

25. •The tokay gecko has the ability to climb •This will benefit anyone who has
up solid surfaces. to clean This creation was made
for climbing up walls or windows.
•It uses it’s tiny barbs on it’s hands and
feet to create an adhesive surface. •This creation could be used for
cleaning windows, and painting
houses.
•It is even recycle able while being
durable.

26. Chataignier tree
and Stability Houses
 Chataignier trees have extra  The design below is an
supports called buttress adaptation to help people in
roots. In case a bad storm the countries prone to
comes by, they have a better hurricanes/ typhoons.
chance of surviving with the  The buttress root design
buttress roots. goes beneath the surface to
 Buttress increase stability.
 House
roots
w/ design

27. The Black
Jewel Bio- Our Invention Mimic-
Beetle
The
Forest
Fire
Detector
 This invention is a special wrist
band that beeps when there is a
forest fire for firefighters and forest
rangers. It is solar powered and
 The Black Jewel Beetle has when it is dark out it uses its stored
special sense organs that can energy to work.
sense forest fires up to 50 miles
away

28. Where to go after lesson
 What ideas do you have?
 Build windmill blades to light up a light-bulb (lab)
 Conservation biology:
 Adaptation
 Population fluctuation
 Sustainable design
 Cost/Benefit Analysis
 Alternative energy
 Biomimicry design project
 http://database.portal.modwest.com/start.php

29.  Snakes skin and shell

30. Links Page: show some if there is
time
Ideas from your classes

31.  -Airplanes modeled after birds (wing and body shapes,
falcon beak)
-Morphing airplane wings that change shape according
to the speed and length of a flight, inspired by birds that
have differently-shaped wings depending on how fast
they fly
-Fish-inspired scales that easily slide over each other to
enable the morphing airplane wings
-Boat hulls designed after the shapes of Fish
-Torpedoes that swim like tuna
-Submarine and boats hull material that imitates
dolphin and shark skin membranes
-Radar and sonar navigation technology and medical
imaging inspired by the echo-location abilities of bats
-Swimsuit, triathlon and bobsled clothing fabric made
with woven ribbing and texture to reduce drag while
maintaining movement, mimics shark’s skin