Drawing inspiration from living things : a method as much as a philosophy

Crea­ting adhe­sives as strong as those of a gecko, threads as solid as spi­der silk, mole­cu­lar detec­tors with the pre­ci­sion of a shark’s sense of smell – these are some of the pos­si­bi­li­ties affor­ded by bio­mi­mi­cry. But that’s not all because, beyond the sen­sa­tio­na­lism of cer­tain pro­ducts ins­pi­red by nature, bio­mi­mi­cry is also part of an ethos and a glo­bal approach to inno­va­tion. “Bio­mi­mi­cry begins with an unders­tan­ding of bio­lo­gi­cal sys­tems, both on a mole­cu­lar level and in natu­ral envi­ron­ments. The know­ledge acqui­red can then be trans­fer­red to other fields of appli­ca­tion, so it is first and fore­most a desi­gn method. It’s also a phi­lo­so­phy,” explains Kali­na Ras­kin, Mana­ging Direc­tor of Cee­bios (Centre d’études et d’expertise en biomimétisme).

“This approach involves dra­wing ins­pi­ra­tion from living things to devise solu­tions com­pa­tible with eco­lo­gi­cal fac­tors,” agrees Emma­nuel Delan­noy, a pio­neer of bio­mi­mi­cry in France and a spe­cia­list in bio­di­ver­si­ty. “Living things offer a set of spe­ci­fi­ca­tions that are rele­vant to today’s eco­no­mic and eco­lo­gi­cal chal­lenges”, he adds. This is because they depend on the rene­wal of raw mate­rials and store CO₂ in a very ener­gy-effi­cient way. “Living orga­nisms only pro­duce mate­rials from atoms that are in plen­ti­ful sup­ply, at ambient tem­pe­ra­ture and pres­sure, and with a very high degree of mate­rial cir­cu­la­ri­ty,” explains Kali­na Ras­kin. “Life forms have adap­ted to all envi­ron­ments and constraints. Sus­tai­na­bi­li­ty is the key issue in this long his­to­ry of co-evo­lu­tion,” adds Emma­nuel Delan­noy.

This approach has alrea­dy led to the deve­lop­ment of pro­ducts that will soon be on the mar­ket, such as pro­pul­sion sys­tems ins­pi­red by the move­ments of fish (EEL Energy’s tidal tur­bines¹, FinX’s motors² and even Corwave’s heart pumps³), pro­ducts for agri­cul­ture based on microal­gae (Car­bon­Works’ CO₂ cap­ture sys­tems⁴, Immunrise’s anti­fun­gals⁵ and Algosource’s bio­ac­tive ingre­dients⁶) or insects (M2i Life Science’s bio­con­trol pro­ducts⁷), or even new tech­no­lo­gies (Prophesee’s reti­na-ins­pi­red came­ra⁸, or Biomemory’s DNA-based data sto­rage⁹). 

Eco­sys­tems don’t favour sim­pli­fied systems

Never­the­less, bio­mi­mi­cry is still not yet a term that is well unders­tood. And it should be known that it is not cur­rent­ly being used with the inten­tion of gree­ning any pro­cess that even remo­te­ly resembles a living object. “We call this trend bio­mi­wa­shing,” says Kali­na Ras­kin. More and more “nature-ins­pi­red” pro­ducts are appea­ring on the mar­ket, and they have more to do with sto­ry­tel­ling than with a scien­ti­fic approach. “The use of bio­mi­me­tic ter­mi­no­lo­gy without any real scien­ti­fic basis under­mines the cre­di­bi­li­ty of the approach”, insists the direc­tor of Ceebios.

Bio­mi­mi­cry is now sub­ject to the ISO 18458 stan­dard, which pro­vides a fra­me­work to use the term. Cee­bios, in part­ner­ship with ADEME and the Saint-Etienne eco-desi­gn clus­ter, is also pre­pa­ring “an intro­duc­to­ry guide to bio­mi­mi­cry for eco-desi­gn”. For Kali­na Ras­kin, the aim is to “explain the impor­tance of the approach and encou­rage manu­fac­tu­rers to mea­sure the bio­mi­mi­cry com­ponent in their processes”.

Emma­nuel Delan­noy sug­gests going even fur­ther. “Eco­sys­tems don’t favour sim­pli­fied sys­tems,” he points out. They tend towards com­plexi­ty and diver­si­fi­ca­tion, esta­bli­shing balances and sha­ring resources. This goes against the grain of cur­rent indus­trial pro­duc­tion methods, which dis­cou­rage diver­si­ty.  The spe­cia­list ima­gines sys­tems whose effi­cien­cy will not be mea­su­red on per­for­mance alone, but capable of moving towards grea­ter com­plexi­ty, tole­ra­ting diver­si­ty and being more fru­gal. “It’s not neces­sa­ri­ly the opti­mi­sa­tion of an out­put that counts, but the balance of the sys­tem”, he explains. He is thin­king, for example, of logis­tics sys­tems that com­bine com­ple­men­ta­ry solu­tions to adapt to dif­ferent condi­tions on the ground.

Bio­mi­mi­cry could also deve­lop by broa­de­ning its models. The bio­lo­gi­cal objects most stu­died from a bio­mi­me­tic angle are the gecko, the shark, the lotus, the eagle, the king­fi­sher, the Japa­nese fugu, spi­der silk, the flip­per of the hump­back whale… “Experts esti­mate that the Earth is home to more than 20 mil­lion spe­cies. But only 2 mil­lion have been iden­ti­fied, and very few have been stu­died at the inter­dis­ci­pli­na­ry inter­faces,” points out Kali­na Raskin.

Today, advo­cates of bio­mi­mi­cry want to incor­po­rate the method into indus­trial tool­kits. “To move from being a novel­ty to a rou­tine pro­cess, we need to increase the num­ber of bio­lo­gi­cal models”, adds Kali­na Raskin.

In res­ponse, Cee­bios has set up a pro­gramme with the Museum natio­nal d’Histoire natu­relle (MNHN) fun­ded by the Banque Publique d’Investissement. The aim is to bring toge­ther indus­try and research labo­ra­to­ries to joint­ly address the issues at stake. “For example, we need new anti­fou­ling coa­tings, mate­rials with bet­ter mecha­ni­cal resis­tance, and new agents for colour opa­ci­ty. To unders­tand these indus­trial issues, we are wor­king with resear­chers at the MNHN to find orga­nisms whose bio­lo­gy we can exa­mine”, explains Kali­na Raskin.

Pro­gress is being made in the deve­lop­ment of the concept. Howe­ver, in order to become tru­ly esta­bli­shed, it will have to over­come a major risk. “There is a strong bias towards tech­no­lo­gi­cal solu­tions, the idea that there is a solu­tion to eve­ry pro­blem, and a tech­no­lo­gi­cal one at that, without taking a cri­ti­cal look at it”, explains Emma­nuel Delan­noy, “this kind of thin­king is not com­pa­tible with the ethics of bio­mi­mi­cry. “We must always ask our­selves whe­ther it is real­ly neces­sa­ry, by taking into account the solu­tion to a real cur­rent need and the human and eco­lo­gi­cal chal­lenges of the future,” insists the specialist.

Agnès Vernet