There are quite a few stories which do the rounds regularly of systems which purport to be derived biomimetically and are nothing of the sort. I have researched some of these, since it seems to me that it's important to sort out how ideas can profitably be moved from biology to technology, and counter-examples might be useful as examples of bad science, wishful thinking, post hoc propter hoc, etc.
The ones I know of are:
**Roof of the Crystal Palace: The corrugated roof was invented in 1810 or earlier by John Claudius Loudon, an inventive horticulturalist, some 40 years before the Crystal Palace was designed and (as far as I can tell) before people in the UK had come across the floating leaves of the lily, Amazonica.. The corrugated roof bears no relation to the leaves of lily, but the half-round arch which tops the Crystal Palace (not present in the original drawings) is very reminiscent of the leaf in its design. There may be a connection there. A result of lax reportage by the Press?
**Eiffel Tower: This was the first structure to be designed according to wind loadings. Its hierarchical strutted structure is probably a result of limited access to the site. The Tower is nothing to do with the structure of bones, tulip stems, or anything else biological.
**Sydney Opera House: Nothing whatsoever to do with shells. It's a shell structure, but that's a technical description. Nothing in the original accounts of its design or structure says anything about a biomimetic origin.
**Polar Bear light guides: The bear's hair does not function as a light guide (shown experimentally) although light guides arranged in the same way can have useful properties.
**Eastgate Centre, Harare: Doesn't work like a termite mound (technically as a stack - chimney - which can draw air through the system) because termite mounds don't work like that! The building was designed before people understood how the nest's gas exchange system really works (it seems to be more like our lungs, semi-tidal and not mixing very much). And people ignore that insects can cope with a wide range of CO2 in the air surrounding them.
Any more to add to this hit list (there must be!)?
How do we rectify these fairy tales?
Julian Vincent
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