Biomimicry is an interdisciplinary approach that applies natural designs and processes for sustainable solutions. Examples discussed include cement inspired by coral reef formation that absorbs CO2, self-cleaning paint inspired by lotus leaves that causes water to bead off, and buildings inspired by termite mounds that use passive ventilation for cooling. A key example is a building in Zimbabwe that uses 20% less energy than conventional buildings through termite-inspired passive ventilation. Other examples include self-healing concrete inspired by bacteria and buildings that harvest fresh water using designs inspired by the Namib Desert beetle's ability to collect water from fog.

1. Biomimicry
Civil Engineering Applications ...

2. Introduction
What is biomimicry?
• Most of the problems humans face today are
also faced by other organisms. Over the course
of evolution, many organisms gained more
efficient ways to use their environment.
• The organisms that are alive today are the
successful models or products of evolution. We
could learn a lot from nature when it comes to
solving our challenges in a sustainable way..

3. Biomimicry

4. Bio-mimicry
• The interdisciplinary field where
technology, science, art, design and
architecture influence each other and use
biology for innovative solutions and
products is called biomimicry.

5. Biomimicry
• Biomimicry can be applied on three levels.
• Firstly, the natural form of organisms are used for
inspiration. For instance, mimicking the structure of a
seashell could lead to stronger buildings.
• Secondly, natural processes, for example chemical
processes such as photosynthesis, can be mimicked
to create more sustainable materials.
• The third level is the ecosystem level. In this level,
entire ecosystems and their functional principles are
mimicked. When a product is made with the help of
biomimicry, it is called a 'biomimetic' product. It can be
biomimetic in terms of form, material, construction,
process or function.

6. Biomimicry can be applied on three
levels.

7. Creating a Sustainable Design
• Thus, Biomimicry is an approach to
innovation that seeks sustainable solutions
to human challenges by emulating nature’s
time-tested patterns and strategies. The goal
is to create products, processes, and policies—
new ways of living—that are well-adapted to
life on earth over the long haul.

8. Examples of Biomimicry
Cement having
Composition of Corals
• Bio-mineralization expert Brent
Constantz of Stanford
University was inspired to make
a new type of cement for
buildings by the way corals
build reefs. The process of
making this cement actually
removes carbon dioxide – a
greenhouse gas, thought to cause
global warming – from the air.
Brent Constantz,
Stanford University

9. Cement like Corals
• The installation takes waste CO2 gas from a local
power plant and dissolves it into seawater to form
carbonate, which mixes with calcium in the seawater
and creates a solid. It’s how corals form their
skeletons, and how Constantz creates cement.

10. Cement like Corals

11. Cement like Corals
• There’s a natural interaction between CO2, which
is a gas, and water. They come into equilibrium
together and the CO2 is dissolved in water. This
forms another molecule, CO3, which is called
carbonate. The higher the concentration of CO2,
the more carbonate is form.

12. Cement like Corals
• Sea water has calcium. When the calcium sees
the carbonate, it forms calcium carbonate, the
solid. That is called limestone, That’s how corals
form their shells.. The solids that form fall to the
bottom and are separated. They’re dried out
using the waste heat from the hot flue gas. That
produces a powder in a spray dryer, which is akin
to a machine making powdered milk. And that
is the cement. The cement can be used to make
aggregate, synthetic rock like synthetic
limestone, or it can be kept dry as a cement
and used in a concrete formulation.

13. Cement like Corals

14. Cement from CO2: A Concrete Cure for
Global Warming?
• Cement from CO2: A Concrete Cure for
Global Warming?

15. Passive cooling in buildings
• The East-gate Complex, located in Harare,
Zimbabwe, is a commercial office and
shopping complex which includes two nine-
storey office buildings and a glazed atrium. In
Zimbabwe’s extremely hot climate, the
building’s primary cooling method is
natural ventilation.

16. The East-gate Complex,
Harare, Zimbabwe

17. Passive cooling in buildings
• Engineers from firm Arup, led by Mick Pearce,
sought inspiration for the ventilation design
from termite mounds since termites require
their home to remain at an exact temperature
of 87°F (30.5°C) throughout a 24-hour daily
temperature range of between 35°F at night
and 104°F during the day (1.6°C to 40°C). The
solution was a passive-cooling structure with
specially designed hooded windows, variable
thickness walls and light coloured paints to reduce
heat absorption.

18. Passive Cooling in Buildings
Ar. Mick Pearce

19. Passive cooling in buildings
• Biomimicry’s Cool Alternative
• Eastgate Centre in Zimbabwe
The Eastgate Centre in Harare, Zimbabwe,
typifies the best of green architecture and
ecologically sensitive adaptation. The
country’s largest office and shopping complex
is an architectural marvel in its use of
biomimicry principles.

20. Passive cooling in buildings

21. Passive cooling in buildings
• Termites in Zimbabwe build gigantic
mounds inside of which they farm a fungus
that is their primary food source. The fungus
must be kept at exactly 87 degrees F, while the
temperatures outside range from 35 degrees F
at night to 104 degrees F during the day. The
termites achieve this remarkable feat by
constantly opening and closing a series of
heating and cooling vents throughout the
mound over the course of the day.

22. Passive cooling in buildings
• With a system of carefully adjusted
convection currents, air is sucked in at the
lower part of the mound, down into
enclosures with muddy walls, and up through
a channel to the peak of the termite mound.
The industrious termites constantly dig new
vents and plug up old ones in order to
regulate the temperature.

23. Termite Mounds

24. Passive cooling in buildings
• The Eastgate Centre, largely made of
concrete, has a ventilation system which
operates in a similar way. Outside air that is
drawn in is either warmed or cooled by the
building mass depending on which is hotter,
the building concrete or the air. It is then
vented into the building’s floors and offices
before exiting via chimneys at the top.

25. Passive cooling in buildings

26. Passive cooling in buildings
• The Eastgate Centre uses less than 10% of the energy of
a conventional building its size. These efficiencies
translate directly to the bottom line: Eastgate’s owners
have saved $3.5 million alone because of an air-
conditioning system that did not have to be
implemented. Outside of being eco-efficient and better for
the environment, these savings also trickle down to the
tenants whose rents are 20 percent lower than those of
occupants in the surrounding buildings.
• Who would have guessed that the replication of designs
created by termites would not only provide for a sound
climate control solution but also be the most cost-
effective way for humans to function in an otherwise
challenging context?

27. Passive cooling in buildings

28. Passive cooling in buildings

29. Self-cleaning paints
• Germany company, StoColor Lotusan® have
developed a biomimicry inspired exterior
coating with a water-repellant surface based on
that of the lotus leaf.
• Professor Wilhem Barthlott, from the
University of Bonn in Germany, developed the
surface after looking for environmentally benign
alternatives to toxic cleaning detergents in
order to reduce environmental impacts.

30. Prof. Wilhem Barthlott

31. Self-Cleaning Paints

32. Self-Cleaning Paints
• He asked the question ‘How does nature
clean surfaces?’ It became obvious that nature
doesn’t use detergents at all – instead it
designs self-cleaning surfaces with
hydrophobic properties.

33. Lotus Effect
• Do you know lotus effect?
• The lotus is an Asiatic aquatic plant known
for the super-hydrophobic behaviour of its
leaves. What does super-hydrophobic mean? It
means that the leaves do not get wet as they
repel water.

34. Lotus Effect

35. Lotus Effect
• When the rain droplets touch the lotus leaves they
remain spherical which allows the droplets to
bounce around until they fall off the leaf which stays
dried.
• This phenomenon carries out other advantages as
when droplets run through the surface they pick up
the dust that accumulates on top, leaving the leaves
completely cleaned as well as dried. This self-
cleaning effect is called lotus effect alluding to this
wonderful plant but it can be also found in other plant
species, birds and even insects.

36. Lotus Effect

37. Lotus Effect
• This phenomenon has aroused great interest
for its numerous potential applications in
self-cleaning materials and in many
different fields.

38. Lotus Effect
• If we take a look at the lotus leaves under the
microscope we will see a very distinctive surface,
built up in 2 levels: tiny bumps can be seen in a
microscopic scale, and on its tips a second level is
formed by thin nano-metric wires. Furthermore,
this structure is covered with a waxy layer that
increases the hydrophobic effect. This doble structure
underpins water dropplets that maintain their spherical
shape and the waxy layer favours the rolling of the
droplets without wetting the leaf surface. Therefore, is
the combination of the physical and chemical effects
what allows to affirm that lotus leaves are super-
hydrophobic.

39. Lotus Effect

40. Leaves of the sacred lotus are self-cleaning
thanks to hydrophobic microscale bumps.
• Lotus plants (Nelumbo nucifera) stay dirt-
free, an obvious advantage for an aquatic plant
living in typically muddy habitats, and they do
so without using detergent or expending
energy.

41. Eco-Friendly House Paint Inspired By The
Self-Cleaning Lotus Flower
• This phenomena has been named the ‘Lotus
Effect’ and, not surprisingly, it has inspired an
entire industry of self-cleaning textiles,
windows, sprays and other products. One of the
more interesting is an eco-friendly house paint
called Lotusan. Developed by a German
company called ISPO, this exterior paint
employs a microstructure modeled after the
hydrophobic leaves of the lotus plant to
minimize the contact area for water and dirt.

42. Lotusan Biomimicry Paint
• Using the same physical technology that
lotus flowers use to keep dry and clean
while growing out of murky water, the paint
adds a texture to the surface of a material
which causes water to form into droplets
and bead off, taking dirt and bacteria with
it.

43. Lotusan Biomimicry Paint

44. Lotusan Biomimicry Paint
• The paint creates microstructures on the façade of
buildings in a way that is similar to the microstructures
on lotus leaves In addition to, keeping the buildings
cleaner, Lotusan also reduces the build-up of algae and
mold. As a result, maintenance costs are lower and
façades have to be repainted less frequently.
• To give an impression of how effective the hydrophobic
effect is: When you stick a spoon with a Lotus leaf-like
surface into a jar of honey, it will come out clean,
without any stickiness. However, functionality is not the
only important factor in the view of sustainability. Chemical
composition and durability are other factors to keep in
mind.

45. Lotusan Biomimicry Paint

46. Self-Healing buildings
• Concrete is the most widely used building material
and is found in almost every building. More than
one m3 of concrete is produced per person on earth
every year. However, the production of concrete has a
serious environmental impact.
• The cement production, which is the primary
component of concrete, contributes more than 5%
to the by human generated greenhouse gas
emissions. Producing one ton of concrete leads to the
emission of 100 kg of CO2. Another problem with
concrete is that it is prone to cracking, which reduces
the lifespan of concrete buildings. Maintaining concrete
buildings is therefore quite expensive.

47. Self-Healing buildings
• Henk Jonkers is a Dutch microbiologist
who, together with the Tu Delft, developed
concrete that fills the cracks that appear over
time Specialized microorganisms that are
added cause this self-healing ability. Strictly
speaking, using bacteria in the concrete
makes this product bio-assisted instead of
biomimetic.

48. Henk Jonkers,
Microbiologist

49. Self-Healing Buildings

50. Self-Healing Buildings
• In nature, bacteria exist that can not only survive in the
arid conditions of concrete, but also produce limestone.
These bacteria can be incorporated, together with
nutrient-containing clay capsules, into the concrete.
Alkaliphilic bacteria of the Bacillus genus are especially
suitable for this application. When the concrete is
undamaged the bacteria are in a dormant state. In the
dormant state, the bacteria form endospores which can
survive for several decades without water and nutrients.
When a crack occurs, water can infiltrate the concrete.
Contact with water reactivates the endospores, causing
the bacteria to grow and form calcite, by oxidation of
calcium lactate. Calcite is a major component of
limestone. The produced calcite fills the crack and
repairs the damage.

51. Self-Healing Buildings

52. Self-Healing Buildings

53. Self-Healing Buildings

54. Self-Healing Buildings

55. Harvesting Fresh Water
• In dry areas such as deserts, fresh water is
scarce and needs to be transported from
other areas. What if we could design
buildings in deserts that can generate their
own fresh water supply?
• The Namib Desert beetle is a source of
inspiration for achieving this goal.

56. Namib Desert Beetle

57. Harvesting Fresh Water
• Namibia is a country located in South-West Africa.
Along its coastline lies the Namib Desert, which is
mostly uninhabited by humans because it is so arid.
Still, there are organisms that can live there, and
amongst them are a few species of the family
Tenebrionidae, also known as Darkling beetles.
• These beetles can survive because they collect water
from the fog that comes from the ocean and spreads
into the desert. This behaviour is called fog basking
Fog events only take place about 30 days per year, but
the yield of water is sufficient for most desert
organisms to survive.

58. Fog Basking

59. Harvesting Fresh Water
• When a fog event occurs, the beetles
Onymacris unguicularis and O. bicolor
stand on their head with their back facing
the wind. Little droplets of water from the
fog collect on their elytra; hardened front
wings which serve as a protective wing case.
Bigger droplets are formed, which roll down
the back of the beetle and into its mouth.

60. Namib Desert Beetle

61. Namib Desert Beetle

62. Harvesting Fresh Water
• Fog-basking behaviour, rather than the
structure of the elytra, has inspired several
architects to design buildings that are able to
collect fog in arid regions. For example, the
Seawater Greenhouse in Oman uses the
evaporation of seawater to create fresh water.
• The seawater is pumped from the sea to the
porous cardboard evaporators at the front of
the greenhouse through pipes. There it
evaporates, which causes the air inside to cool
down and humidify.

63. Seawater Greenhouse in Oman

64. Seawater Greenhouse in Oman

65. Harvesting Fresh Water
• This in turn reduces the transpiration rate in the
plants, resulting in a lowered need for irrigation.
When water evaporates, the salt is left behind in
the evaporators, leaving the water desalinated. In
the roof of the building, seawater running through
black pipes is heated by the sun, which causes the
surrounding air to be hot and saturated. When the hot
air passes through pipes with cool seawater, water
starts to condensate on the pipes.

66. Harvesting Fresh Water

67. Harvesting Fresh Water
• This fresh water can be collected and stored in
a tank. Not only the inside of the greenhouse
profits from this system, but the area outside it
becomes green as well. The water that escapes
the greenhouse forms fog and rain, causing plants
to grow in the previously dried out soil Imagine
that this technique could transform dry areas,
in which no agriculture was previously possible
without enormous costs of energy and water,
into green, food- and water-producing
settlements.

68. Harvesting Fresh Water

69. Harvesting Fresh Water
• Not only agriculture could benefit from this
technique, but a wide range of buildings could
be designed to desalinate seawater and provide
a more sustainable source of fresh water for
arid urban areas. In the Canary Islands, a start
was made with the Las Palmas Water Theatre,
designed by architect Nick Grimshaw Although
it has not yet been built, the design has gained a
lot of attention, because it is not only an eye-
catching building, but it could also supply a
large part of the city of Las Palmas with fresh
water.

70. Las Palmas Water Theatre

71. Las Palmas Water Theatre

72. References
• Architect Mick Pearce
http://www.mickpearce.com/
• Biomimicry Institute,
Missoula, Montana ,USA
https://biomimicry.org/what-is-biomimicry/
• Brent Constantz - Associate Professor of Geological and Environmental Sciences
https://biox.stanford.edu/about/people/affiliated-faculty/brent-constantz-consulting-associate-
professor-geological-and
• Las Palmas Water Theatre
http://www.exploration-architecture.com/projects/las-palmas
• Researcher Henk Jonkers from TU Delft Uniiversity
http://www.tudelft.nl/en/current/latest-news/article/detail/zelfherstellend-biobeton-tu-delft-
genomineerd-voor-european-inventor-award/
• Seawater Greenhouse in Oman
http://www.seawatergreenhouse.com/oman.html
• Urban Biology,
http://www.projects.science.uu.nl/urbanbiology/articlepagebiomim.html
• Professor Wilhem Barthlott
http://lotus-salvinia.de/index.php/en/12-kategorie-deutsch/kontakt-ueber-uns/psite/11-prof-
wilhelm-barthlott

73. There no better design than nature…

74. Thanks…