The document discusses the concept of biomimicry, which is applying design solutions found in nature to human problems and needs. It argues that biomimicry has strong potential for innovation but has not been fully utilized. Universities could act as incubators for the concept by facilitating cross-disciplinary collaboration between fields like biology and engineering to identify biological traits with commercial applications. Over time, some corporations have begun incorporating biomimicry approaches, but wider adoption faces challenges like communication barriers between different fields and challenging existing business mindsets.

1. BatuBatuReef&IslandsStudyCentre
by Arkitrek | July 28th, 2011 | Other Projects, Responsible Tourism | One Comment
Text: by Ian Hall
Photos: by Ian Hall and Fauzan Aris
Pulah Babi Tengah (Middle Pig Island!) off the coast of Johor, Malaysia used to be a refugee camp run by
UNHCR back in the 70’s. I’m not sure how idyllic a refugee camp could be but former interns, mostly
Vietnamese, now Australian, seem to have fond recollections of the place. Stepping out of the glare of the
sun and into the cool shade of the casaurina grove, you don’t have to look far to find relics of the refugee
camp. The design team for the Batu Batu Reef and Island Study Centre (BRISC) pause to spread out their
kit atop a concrete well, one of a network of wells which supplied water to the island’s former transient
residents.
The BRISC big idea is to link beach tourism with marine
conservation, in this case facilitated by a partnership between Batu Batu Resort and Wild Asia. This
partnership will inspire others to adopt principles of responsible tourism. After all, the tourism product in

2. this case is crystal clear sea, clean beaches and abundant marine life. It makes good sense to protect this
resource.
Swatting troublesome mosquitoes and sand flies we debate where the living, working, chilling and dive
centre functions of the BRISC should go. Someone told me once that casaurinas are colonial trees, as in,
they grow in colonies. Their encircling trunks enclose a soft floor of needles, a shady and natural gathering
place. Two such groves form the starting point for our site layout design concepts.
There will be a beach bar, naturally, on the beach. It will close shortly after sunset and the lights turned
down to give those turtles a chance to navigate without distraction. There’s a gap between the casaurina
groves which is an obvious place to connect the beach bar with the living and working areas under the
trees.
Our intern Fauzan Aris, an architecture graduate from University of Malaya, is measuring the depth of a
UNHCR well with a tape measure. Dr Reza Azmi, founder of Wild Asia is dangling a water sampler into
the same well to test it’s salinity amongst other things. I’m looking at an Asian Brown Flycatcher through
my binoculars.
There is a cluster of three wells on our site and the BRISC living and working areas will be built around
them. The thick screen of vegetation at the beach edge will be retained. Those thick waxy leaves of
Barringtonia and Terminalia trees are adept at retaining water in this harsh environment. They’re also
pretty handy at providing shade and screening.
Other areas of the site are characterised by clumps of hibiscus and the leaning knobbly trunks of a
leguminous tree species. It is in the legumes that I am watching the flycatcher and from their canopy
comes the constant cheep-cheep of sun birds and flowerpeckers. Using illustrations in sketchbooks perched
on the well covers we discuss how to retain this ecosystem.
Some trees will have to go of course but we can move the buildings around to protect and integrate larger
trees and clumps of trees. We can also translocate the forest floor by about 6m vertically to the green roofs
of the BRISC living, working and dive centre areas. Even the beach bar, poking out over the sand, can
have a green roof. They’re very tenacious those casaurina and terminalia saplings. Can grow anywhere,
although on the beach bar roof they may need to be kept trimmed so as not to overgrow the photo-voltaic
panels.
Slap, slap, splat….scratch, scratch. Sand flies win and we adjourn to the beach now that the sun is going
down. Our minds are buzzing and architect Leong Seng Kheong engages Reza in a furious sand etcha-

3. sketch one-on-one battle. A sweep of the hand erases the previous sketch and simultaneously prepares a
clean canvas for the next. Fingers etch out blobs and squares and lines and voila! A site layout design
concept.
When BRISC is up and running the day to day activities will include monitoring changes in natural
resources, including biodiversity. This data will provide evidence for how well the tourism operation is
safeguarding the environment and allow it to adjust appropriately. The presence of naturalists and
environmental science type fellas on the island will add value to the tourists’ experience and understanding
of their impacts on the environment.
The presence of the dive centre will allow these studies to focus on the marine environment, although
hopefully there will still be space for those who prefer binoculars to snorkelmasks.

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Solar Powered Floating ResortConcept
by kamnPosted on June 19, 2012
Solar Powered Floating Resort Island is a design concept for a comfortable
and adventurous eco-conscious getaway at sea by Italy-based industrial
designer Michele Puzzolante. The resort is described by the designer as
part habitation, part yacht, and part submarine.
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Gallery
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Posted in InspirationTagged solar
Author: kamn

6. I am freelance web designer and developer with a passion for interaction
design. I love communication, creativity, technology and everything in
between. View all posts by kamn
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7. Biomimicry incubators: the business case for conservation
The business opportunities found in biomimicry - the
application of characteristics found in species to human
innovation - makes a strong case for biodiversity
conservation, says Siloso Beach Resort sustainability director
Sylvain Richer de Forges.
An extractfrom
Otto Lilienthal’sMechanicsof White StorkflightinhisDerVogelflugalsGrundlage derFliegekunst
(1889). Biomimicryisthe applicationof characteristicsfoundinthe natural worldtoinnovationfor
humanneeds.
By Sylvain Richer de Forges
Monday 24 November2014
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Biomimicry refers to the study of species characteristics in order to
derive ideas that could serve our everyday applications. More
specifically it is the field of gaining inspiration from nature first to
solve some of our most difficult challenges.Instead of coming up
with our own solutions to a problem, the odds are that species on
the planet already offer an ultimate solution.
This simple fact is also another strong case to preserve species at all
cost, as the intellectual heritage contained within or through the
study of species is both irreplaceable and invaluable.Despite a
promising start at the end of the 20thcentury,the concept hasn’t
really been exploited at all to the level it could be: the potential
hasn’t been understood.
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The analogy between natural and corporate systems
The concept of biomimicry is simple: because species on Earth have
been around and evolved for hundreds of millions of years, the
adaptations that they have developed over the ages have provided
them with ultimate optimization attributes with regards to how they
interact with their surrounding conditions.

9. It therefore makes a lot of sense for corporations and governments
to search for answers to a multitude of problems faced in the fields
of medicine, engineering, architecture and optimal design, among
others, by studying species as it is likely that they hold the answers.
We often acknowledge that time allows for improvement.For
instance, in the corporate world, many products such as detergents
and air conditioners have slowly improved over time to become
more efficient in terms of their usage for a specific purpose, for
instance in these particular cases respectively cleaning clothes and
cooling the indoor air. We can notice this simple rule in most
consumergoods that we buy: products get better over time.
This is also true with species: over time, they become better adapted
to their surroundingconditions for the simple reason that if they do
not adapt, they end up becoming extinct. It is a simple fact that in
an environment free of human interference species constantly
compete for survival and this drives adaptive changes pushing for
optimisation to surrounding conditions.
In the corporate world, things work in a similar way: agencies gain
an advantage by becoming better adapted to the surrounding
conditions, which can range from market demand, product design,
cost efficiency and other factors, will end up pushing unfit
competitors out of business.
The similarities between the natural and business world suggest
that nature-inspired business models should be adopted instead of
current frameworks which are clearly unfit for current and future
challenges ahead. Indeed, the current business and societal models
to not anticipate and accommodate well to the world growing
problems such as inevitable global climate change and related
changes in Earth systems that societies will eventually have to face
and adapt to.

10. The bio-corporation business model
The idea of “bio-corporations” - corporations which will eventually
incorporate a biomimicry approach to the continuous improvement
process as part of their core business model - is a potential solution
for the concept of biomimicry to take off. The idea relies on a
progressive approach to biomimicry, first using universities as
incubators before spreading the concept to corporations. .
The concept is simple: corporations should include a biomimicry
department within their business structure. This department would
work closely with other departments such as research and
development within the business and would act as a central
mechanisms for idea generation from which corporate strategic
decisions can be derived. The basic framework is highlightedbelow:
1. Species are studied by biologists who are able to identify traits
that could benefit the business. The knowledge of biologists
will be handy in identifying potential target species, which
could have traits relevant to the core business of the
organisation.
There are now a multitude of good examples of this such as: a
shutterresistant windscreen derived from the structure of
oysters; new generations of revolutionary computers utilizing
neuronal connections inspired from species brain; new types
of light and resistant airplane materials derived from the cell
structures of a species of shrimp; camouflage materials
derived from species of octopus; a syntheticleaf that is able to
produce oxygen inspired from species of plants; a range of
robots inspired from a variety of species muscle and walking
patterns; the bullet train nose inspired from a kingfishers bird
beak; a multitude of nature inspired architectures;and many

11. others.
2. Once these traits have been identified, they are passed on to
other applied departments which will then focus their research
on incorporating these traits within the products design.
Attempts to translate a species’ trait into a commercial idea
could involve chemistry, mechanical design, or architectural
planning, among others. Products with these traits would
increase the business’ competitiveness.
While it might take years of research to achieve the desired product
outcome, the chances of success are far greater than the current
research approach used by corporations of trying to improve their
products through trial and error, reverse engineeringof existing
products, and market research. There are so many innovative ideas
out there in nature that remain unexplored.
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In the end biomimicry processes could potentially save significant
amounts of money compared to current research and development
practices. But most importantly the risk factor is significantly
reduced as well.
The reason for this is that the efficiency of traits within species for a
specific application is already proven from the fact that species have
survived using these well adapted traits for so long. Extracting these
traits will save research development time and is likely to be an
innovation breakthrough.In fact if we look at most biomimicry
inspired applications they attract a lot of attention for being
innovative.

12. Universities as incubators
Universities provide a unique settingto try out this concept as they
have all the attributes necessary for success including the research
framework and the different faculties that would in fact mimic the
corporate structures with their various departments.
Led by the faculty of biology, identified traits of interest within
species could easily be passed on to other faculties such as
engineering, medical sciences, chemistry, social sciences and others
as needed in order to mimic and adapt the traits for commercial
industrial applications.
In addition to the above interfaculty framework,established
universities also have the right setting to develop and issue patents
and in so doing, bridge the gap between the academic and corporate
worlds.
It would be much easier to implement such a concept in a university
environment than a corporate one because universities have a
mandate to innovate in the first place, which is not necessarily
commercially driven.
The challenges faced
There are obvious reasons why biomimicry hasn’t really taken off.
Communications issues:Because biomimicry research requires a
very close interaction between multidisciplinary teams of biologists,
engineers, chemists,mechanical designers, artists, amongst others.
The work of these groups of people does not often overlap;
sometimes,they may simply not speak the same “language”. A
multidisciplinary approach is key to the success of bio-inspired
corporations.

13. Mind-set changes: Business have been operating using the same old
industrial age models and hierarchy strategies for so many years
that it has become a great challenge to change people’s mind-sets
due to the inertia it has engendered. Business leaders who see the
potential of biomimicry are the ones who could make a real change,
starting with their own enterprise as a showcase and then spreading
the concepts and successes forother businesses to follow on.
The revolution has already started
In 2013 an initiative reflectingthis mind-set was started with
funding from the US National Science Foundation with the aim to
study business pioneers which have started to incorporate
biodiversity preservation concepts within their business
framework..
Bio-inspired corporations are likely to be the next business
revolution,but the concept has yet to be taken seriously by business
leaders and government decision makers.
Sylvain Richer de Forges is director of sustainability, Siloso Beach
Resort and foundaer of Biodiversity.sg. This article was written
exclusively for Eco-Business.
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