Biological Analogues in Engineering Practice

Abstract

Cross fertilization could be the most important lesson that the life sciences have to offer to civil, mechanical and electrical engineering. A start has been made and bioengineering is now accepted as a discipline, yet dramatic changes are needed in its outlook. Rather than seeking answers to a thousand questions, bioengineering must observe the answers and only ask: ‘For such a shape to have evolved what were the questions?’ The laws of physics may not form as profitable a starting point as the fundamentals of engineering such as symmetry, analogy and topology. Bioengineering has many of the features of a ‘whodunnit’, and is far more challenging, far more exciting and certainly more rewarding.