#biomimetics

Word of the week. Palabra de la semana.  

Steady Burs

If you go down to the woods today you might come home covered in sticky plant parts. These may be the burs or dry fruit of 'hitchhiker' plants like Harpagonella palmeri (left) – they often use animals as vehicles to spread their seeds. Bioengineers are very interested in H. palmeri’s secret – tiny hooks (seen zoomed in on the right), which allow the fruit to spread their weight across an attached surface, especially one that might be moving quickly. The researchers find that varying the spacing, size and stiffness of these hooks allows the plants to balance the stressful forces involved, so they can cling on. The team are now investigating ways to mimic these plucky plants in human surgery, where, H. palmeri might inspire new ways of attaching moving tendons to bones.

Written by John Ankers

Image left by Matt Berger on Wikipedia

Image right and research by Ethan D. Hoppe et al, Genin Lab, NSF Science and Technology Center for Engineering Mechanobiology, Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, MO, USA

Image left published under a CC-BY-4.0 license. Image right copyright Genin Lab, WUSTL

Research published in Proceedings of the Royal Society A, March 2023

Solarpunk & Biomimicry Leading Future of Sustainability

Real biomimetics is certainly a little bit less slick looking than a sci-fi ipod-looking 3d render, but the cool part was using AI designs based on real lobster neurons to help the robot better flip itself over or dislodge itself from obstacles on the seafloor. DARPA was interested in the design concept’s potential in surveying for underwater mines.

(This was Titor and Tertius’ entry to the God Machine event a long time ago! I recently found my transcript and want to archive it here since I enjoyed the event and writing it so much!)

The Garlean Pureblood saunters up to the center of the area. He walked with a cane slowly, stiffly, almost as if he may have been in some amount of pain. He wore very Garlean looking armor, trying to go for the Imperial intimidation factor. He paused for a moment in silence, before beginning his speech.

"Greetings! I am Titor mal Jaraba, and am pleased to present the months of hard work put into the Ceruleum Hound. Now, many of you may have encountered, seen, or heard of the otherworldly beasts known as hellhounds. These ferocious predators prowl and hunt from within the void, infinitely more fearsome than the common mutt that we know here on Hydaelyn. In collaboration with my uncle, Tertius nan Celerus, a biomimetics and prosthetics engineer whom you may know from his previous works and publications at the Magitek Academy. Unfortunately, as much as he wished to attend, Tertius was unable to be here for this competition."

From behind an ally, a large, mechanical, silvery Hellhound walks out. About the size as a real grown hellhound, its height would tower over many of them there. Each step upon the ground caused a dull metallic clack. The mech swayed back and forth, giving it a lifelike, organic motion. It never seemed to stand still, constantly looking 'alive'. It clearly was not though, as it was most definitely made of metal.

"Tertius has handled the primary hardware design and biomimetics of this mechanical hellhound, he has tried to remain true to the hellhound form while incorporating additional, evolved aspects into the magitek. The claws and fangs are reinforced with a special and secret new alloy that has some... interesting properties. Don't think that the organic design of the Ceruleum Hound will put it at any disadvantage from your common battletek tank designs, reaper designs, or whatnot. This beast can hold its own in form and function."

Pressing a button on a remote, the Hound kicks up onto its rear legs and claws at the air, revealing its massively sharp claws, as well as the agility and fluid organic motions that accompanied it. Its tail lashed back and forth violently like a whip, a loud audible woosh was heard with each swipe from the speed and power at which it moved. The end of it was barbed with spikes that could retract or extend. Its body was covered in various retractable and expendable spikes as well.

The horns upon its head also seemed to have some amount of mobility with them. Each were tipped with a small but powerful saw for cutting. The magitek beast gave a mechanical unholy howl, powerful and bellowing and very otherworldly sounding. The fangs of the magitek were piercingly sharp and shiny, with small injectors on each to be able to spit or secrete a particular acid to chew through armor or other components.

The hound followed up its demonstration by showing its agility. It jumped into the air and whipped around quickly, using the angular momentum to change its facing by the time that it landed. It then dropped its front legs down slightly and dipped its head, emitting a low mechanical growl. The movements really did resemble that of a real hound in movement and fluidity.

"The Ceruleum Hound has been designed with combat in mind, particularly combat against other 'teks. Using a combination of the horns, tail, mouth, claws, and organic reflexes, the Ceruleum Hound can rip and shred its way through other tek's armor, pierce any hydraulics, and ruin circuitry."

"Hardware aside, my part in the Ceruleum Hound's creation is with the programming and nanoreflexive defenses. The Hound adapts through a series of biomimetic network meshes, allowing it to predict, evolve, and adapt to its enemy, similar to the techniques employed by the ancient Allagans when fighting the Eikons. We're not quite at Allagan level of perfection yet, but I do hope that you will find my algorithms to be cutting edge and impressive for our recreation of these adaptive techniques."

"The nanoreflexive devices allow the Hound to reinforce itself at attack points. Like a shifting armor to protect against impact points while still keeping its lightweight and agile chassis."  He would take his cane and whack the Hound in its metallic flank. The metal around the area of impact would quickly shift and darken, thickening at that particular area. The Hound then completed its demo by doing a variety of doglike tricks.