Design Like Nature: Biomimicry for a Healthy Planet

Design Like Nature: Biomimicry for a Healthy Planet — page 3
Chapter One Inventions Gone Wild The secrets to a sustainable world are all around us Janine Benyus cofounder The Biomimicry Institute How does nature design How does nature design Biomimicry is the scientific term for copying nature not only to solve human problems but also to help protect our planet Bio means life and mimicry means the action of imitating so put them together and you’ve got the science of copying nature Everything from the largest mammals to the tiniest bacteria has spent millions of years figuring out how to work with the natural cycles of the planet It’s pretty neat that nature runs on sunlight and water Humans on the other hand use fossil fuels and toxic chemicals Nature wastes nothing but humans have left garbage pretty much everywhere on Earth The great news is we can change our ways There are solutions We just have to ask nature Take something as common as a leaf A leaf gains its energy to grow from the sun By studying the structure of a leaf we can learn more about how the leaf does this Then we can take our There’s more to a leaf than we can see at first glance KYRYL GORLOV GETTY IMAGES 88