Engineers find elegant design solutions in the natural world.

In the not-so-distant past, engineering and biology were two distinct fields of study that rarely had much to do with each other. No more. Nature, once strictly the realm of biologists, is increasingly being scrutinized by engineers, who appreciate that it can offer sustainable, energy-efficient solutions to vexing human problems.

Biomimicry is a fast-growing, multidisciplinary field of industrial design based on several billion years’ worth of research and development —  courtesy of evolution. Here’s a small sample of the many engineering innovations inspired by the natural world.

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Tags: Biomimicry

When he was a senior in high school, Marc Edwards was sure he wanted to be a veterinarian. But after he spent a summer working with pets and getting bitten, he realized that “vets end up treating the owners more than the animals.” So he switched to civil engineering. Edwards is now a professor at Virginia Tech.

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Filed under: Civil, Environmental, Explore Engineering | Comments Off on Class Acts: The Water Guy

Tags: Civil Engineering, environmental engineering

Oddsmakers probably wouldn’t have bet money that Armando Rodriguez would one day become a professor. He grew up in a rough New York City neighborhood in the 1960s and 1970s, and many of his friends were lost to the streets. His mother died of cancer when he was 13, and his father was a window cleaner. “He couldn’t provide much advice to me other than, ‘Go to school or I’m going to kill you,’” Rodriguez says. But his father did steer him to someone in the neighborhood who Rodriguez says saved his life. “He was the guy who saved me from juvenile delinquency and worse later on. He bought me books and helped me with projects. I know the difference an individual can make in a person’s life — I’ve lived it.”

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Tags: Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering

When Marcus Ashford was studying mechanical engineering at Louisiana State University, there wasn’t a single black faculty member in the department. Now, as an assistant professor at the University of Alabama, he hopes to inspire change. “A lot of kids don’t see themselves in certain positions because they’ve never seen anyone like them doing it,” he says. “We are our own best recruiters. If the work that we do is exciting enough, and you can get people to see that, we’ll draw them in.”

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Tags: Environmental, Mechanical

Rebecca Richards-Kortum sees the engineer in everyone. It’s one way this Rice University professor of bioengineering helps undergraduates in many disciplines create solutions to global health problems.

She leads a program called Beyond Traditional Borders, which allows students to tackle specific challenges faced by health care providers in developing countries.

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Filed under: Biomedical, Explore Engineering | 1 Comment »

Tags: Biomedical, Bioscience, Biotechnology, Technology