Author(s) :

Ziqian Zhou .

Volume/Issue :

Abstract :

The interdisciplinary practice of biomimicry, finding design solutions based on living organisms, is often celebrated for its sustainable potential, with nature portrayed as having already solved the problem of building without waste. This narrative review assesses the degree of biological imitation across notable examples from this growing field and the available environmental evidence supporting them. This work involves a structured critical synthesis, where a set of canonical case studies featured repeatedly, including in the field’s seminal text, is analyzed for their level of biological imitation, form, process, or ecosystem, with set criteria for which organism feature was imitated and whether the environmental evidence of the biomimicry rested in production or use. The examples of the biomimicry discipline’s acclaimed successes cluster almost exclusively at the form level, copying a shape or surface such as a paint inspired by lotus leaves or the nose of a train shaped like a kingfisher, and then employing the same industrial practices that the discipline asserts it seeks to transcend. An acclaimed example of the process level, the Eastgate Centre in Harare, uses passive cooling design without conventional air conditioning, but the mechanisms for what was purportedly a mimicry of a termite mound have since been reworked by biologists. Ultimately, it is clear that biological inspiration is simply that, and not necessarily linked to life-cycle environmental costs. Accounts of these cases often conflate the two, and any sustainability claims must instead focus on life-cycle evidence.