This grant provides funding for investigating how biologically inspired principles and solutions can support engineering design in pursuit of solutions that are technically and environmentally superior. Numerous inventions can be traced to inspirations received from biological systems. The proposed research will a) expand an existing biomimicry database with content and solutions focused on selected mechanical engineering processes in order to facilitate integration of bio-inspired solutions into engineering design processes; b) identify a set of overarching principles of the biosphere and its living systems which can be used as guidelines for environmentally preferred practices; c) integrate and apply these biomimicry principles and concepts to selected case studies, verify the results, and outline a framework for a biologically inspired multi-scale Environmentally Benign Design Guidance System. The work will be integrated with engineering capstone design classes with the dual goal to expose engineering students and practitioners to biomimicry as well as to gain insight into the efficiency and effectiveness of the approach. If successful, the results of this research will lead to indicators, metrics, and tools for assessing environmental performance from observed inherent principles of living systems and biosphere and provide a novel approach for environmental impact reduction. This work directly links engineers and biologists to formalize and test the applicability of biomimetic principles in engineering design to achieve technically and environmentally superior designs, creating an economic and ecological win-win situation. While several authors and scientists have suggested or called for a turn to nature for environmental guidance, a formal development of these ideas in EBDM is both new and unique.
