Biomimicry in Montana

Hi friends,

We continue our return trip back east, stopping in Missoula, Montana to visit the Biomimicry Institute.

Biomimicry is "the process of learning from and then emulating Nature's genius to create more sustainable designs. It's studying a leaf to invent a better solar cell or an electric eel to make a better battery." The Biomimicry Institute works to educate designers and inventors to ask nature first - before trying to reinvent the wheel, look to nature first for solutions for design ideas, because whatever the design challenge nature has already done it somewhere!

You may remember back before we left for our cross-country journey in May we interviewed Janine Benyus, who founded the Biomimicry Institute, has written several books, and travels for conferences, training, etc. Janine wasn't going to be in Missoula while we came through so we were able to get some time with her while she was stopping in Boston. Unfortunately for us, five minutes into the interview our video camera completely 'spazzed out' and we had to cut the interview short. I felt that biomimicry was such an important topic for our video series that I asked to interview someone at the Institute in Missoula to complete the video. They were gracious enough to give us some more time and this time the camera cooperated!

Carrick interviewed Bryony Schwan, the Executive Director of the Biomimicry Institute, and it was a great visit. Bryony showed us several examples of biomimicry, really fascinating stuff. One fabric company wanted to make a waterproof and self-cleaning fabric without chemicals, and they found a great solution in biomimicry. When water falls on a lotus leaf it beads up and runs off, and any dirt that collects on the leaf washes right off. The secret is in the surface structure of the leaf itself, with many small bumps we can't see. Bryony showed us two swatches of cloth identical in appearance. The first she held under the tap and it absorbed water as you would expect. The second cloth was using the same material but when it was sewn it was given the same surface structure as the leaf and when held under the tap the water just rolled right off. From our eyes and touch both cloths were the same. Imagine the applications for something like that - building surfaces, car paint, etc.

She also showed us a few other examples that were fascinating: Carrick's watch is coated with a film that makes it glow in the sunlight, without using any power. The film was developed by Qualcomm for cell phones and was created with biomimicry. Both abalone shells and butterfly wings have that same iridescent glow and they were both analyzed to find out what compound makes them reflect light that way. They used the same coating on cell phone displays, since backlighting the displays uses a lot of battery power. From there other companies have used the coating and it turned out that the watch Carrick got has that same coating. We also saw a new design for fans and water mixers - think of the spiral shape of a conch shell and other seashells, or that of fiddlehead ferns. The new design reduces energy consumption by 35-70% and noise up to 75%.

There are many amazing examples of biomimicry at www.biomimicryinstitute.org.

Be well,
Colin
www.OurRenewableNation.org