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Tags: biomimicry

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  Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature

  by Janine M. Benyus

  Biomimicry is a revolutionary new science that analyzes nature's best ideas -- spider silk and prairie grass, seashells and brain cells -- and adapts them for human use. Science writer and lecturer Janine Benyus takes us into the lab and out in the field with the maverick researchers who are applying nature's ingenious solutions to the problem of human survival: stirring vats of proteins to unleash their signaling... (more)
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  Cradle to Cradle

  Remaking the Way We Make Things

  by William McDonough, Michael Braungart

  A manifesto for a radically different philosophy and practice of manufacture and environmentalism "Reduce, reuse, recycle" urge environmentalists; in other words, do more with less in order to minimize damage. As William McDonough and Michael Braungart argue in their provocative, visionary book, however, this approach perpetuates a one-way, "cradle to grave" manufacturing model that dates to the Industrial... (more)
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  The Gecko's Foot

  Bio-inspiration - Engineering New Materials from Nature

  by Peter Forbes

  A riveting account of the unexpected relationship between nature and scientific design. "Study nature, love nature, stay close to nature. It will never fail you." When Frank Lloyd Wright said this, he probably wasn't envisioning self-cleaning surfaces, the photonic crystal, or Velcro. But nature has indeed yielded such inventions for those scientists and engineers who heeded the architect's words. The... (more)
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  Mid-Course Correction: Toward a Sustainable Enterprise: The Interface Model

  by Ray Anderson

  Of value to business people, environmentalists, and educators alike, Mid-Course Correction is a business book about the enviornment that's written from a personal perspective. With passion and pride, Ray Anderson, Founder, Chairman and CEO of one of the world's largest interior furnishings companies, recounts his awakening to the importance of environmental issues and outlines the steps his ... (more)
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  The Phenomenon of Life: Book 1

  The Nature of Order

  by Christopher Alexander

  What is happening when a place in the world has life? And what is happening when it does not? In Book 1 of this four-volume work, Alexander describes a scientific view of the world in which all space-matter has perceptible degrees of life, and sets this understanding of living structure as an intellectual basis for a new architecture. He identifies fifteen geometric properties which tend to accompany the presence... (more)
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  A Vision of a Living World: The Nature of Order, Book 3

  by Christopher Alexander

  In Book 3 of this four-volume work, Alexander presents hundreds of his own buildings and those of other contemporaries who have used methods consistent with the theory of living process. Nearly seven hundred pages of projects, built and planned in many countries over a thirty-year period, illustrate the impact of living process on the world. The book provides the reader with an intuitive feel for the kind of... (more)
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  Optimisation Mechanics in Nature (Design and Nature)

  This book comprises a study of the two great organic solids in Nature, namely wood and bone. The common scientific laws which act in parallel for both natural and man-made materials are detailed here as wood and bone are studied in their natural structural environment as well as in the fields of engineering structural analysis and medical analysis. The relationship between them enables wood to be used in... (more)
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  Life in Moving Fluids: The Physical Biology of Flow (Princeton Paperbacks)

  by Steven Vogel

  Both a landmark text and reference book, Steven Vogel's Life in Moving Fluids has also played a catalytic role in research involving the applications of fluid mechanics to biology. In this revised edition, Vogel continues to combine humor and clear explanations as he addresses biologists and general readers interested in biological fluid mechanics, offering updates on the field over the last dozen years and... (more)
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  From Gaia to Selfish Genes: Selected Writings in the Life Sciences

  In a well-blended presentation, writings from more than 30 scientists and science writers span scales from the biosphere to the cell to DNA, encompass disciplines from global ecology to behavior and genetics, and explore links between biology and philosophy. Connie Barlow is a science writer.
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  Li

  Dynamic Form in Nature

  by David Wade

  David Wade has spent a lifetime gathering and organizing the extraordinary families of surface patterns that nature throws up at every scale. The study of these shapes-a subject virtually unknown in the West-was known in ancient China as Li and is the sister science to Feng Shui. In this unique and insightful book are sand and wave patterns, big-cat markings, bark and leaf designs, soap and marbling swirls,... (more)
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  Design With Nature

  by Ian L. McHarg

  With a distinct emphasis on human cooperation and biological partnership in design, the author explores the relationship between the built environment and nature to illustrate how both can be used to their full potential without being detrimental or destructive to each other. Provides a combination of scientific insight and constructive design, and shows how to employ what nature offers to the fullest extent... (more)
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  Turbulent Mirror: An Illustrated Guide to Chaos Theory and the Science of Wholeness

  by John Briggs

  Until recently, such phenomena as the volatility of weather systems, the fluctuation of the shock market, or the random firing of neurons in the brain were considered too "noisy" and complex to be probed by science. But now, with the aid of high-speed computers, scientists have been able to penetrate a reality that is changing the way we perceive the universe. Their findings -- the basis for chaos theory --... (more)
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  Natural Capitalism

  Creating the Next Industrial Revolution

  by Paul Hawken, Amory B. Lovins, L. Hunter Lovins

  Most businesses still operate according to a world view that hasn't changed since the start of the Industrial Revolution. Then, natural resources were abundant and labor was the limiting factor of production. But now, there's a surplus of people, while natural capital natural resources and the ecological systems that provide vital life-support services is scarce and relatively expensive. In this groundbreaking... (more)
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  Exploring The Way Life Works: The Science of Biology

  by Mahlon B. Hoagland

  The perfect answer for any instructor seeking a more concise, meaninful, and flexible alternative to the standard introductory biology text.
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  The Nature of Economies

  by Jane Jacobs

  From the revered author of the classic The Death and Life of Great American Cities comes a new book that will revolutionize the way we think about the economy. Starting from the premise that human beings "exist wholly within nature as part of natural order in every respect," Jane Jacobs has focused her singular eye on the natural world in order to discover the fundamental models for a vibrant economy. The... (more)
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  Computers and the imagination: Visual adventures beyond the edge

  by Clifford A. Pickover

  Art and science are conflated in Pickover's new discipline of "scientific visualizations," demonstrated here in a colorful sampler for math hobbyists and puzzle fans, containing computer-generated palindromes, Fibonacci-based structures, artificial spider webs and fractal palaces of wonder. Here is mathematics' beauty made visible, with super computers and a kind of cybernetic aesthetic. Pickover's short,... (more)
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  Computers, Pattern, Chaos and Beauty

  by Clifford A. Pickover

  Combining fractal theory with startling computer art, this book reveals an entirely new way of seeing. Part I introduces computer graphics and the creative use of computers. Part II describes various graphical methods for representing and detecting patterns in complicated data. Part III illustrates simple techniques for visualizing chaotic behavior. "No human being should pass up the experience of stepping through... (more)
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  Green Chemistry: Theory and Practice

  by Paul T. Anastas

  This book provides the first introductory treatment of the design, development, and evaluation processes central to Green Chemistry. A comprehensive textbook, it takes a broad view of the subject and integrates a wide variety of approaches. Topics include alternative feedstocks, environmentally benign syntheses, the design of safer chemical products, new reaction conditions, alternative solvents and catalyst... (more)
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  Cats' Paws and Catapults: Mechanical Worlds of Nature and People

  by Steven Vogel

  Nature and humans build their devices with the same earthly materials and use them in the same air and water, pulled by the same gravity. Why, then, do their designs diverge so sharply? Humans, for instance, love right angles, while nature's angles are rarely right and usually rounded. Our technology goes around on wheels--and on rotating pulleys, gears, shafts, and cams--yet in nature only the tiny ... (more)
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  Life's Other Secret

  The New Mathematics of the Living World

  by Ian Stewart

  "Stewart writes with such compelling clarity that general readers can share in the intellectual daring of his perspective."—Booklist An invitation to a hidden world In Life’s Other Secret, mathematician and award-winning science writer Ian Stewart reveals the way mathematics describes the origin, structure, and evolution of life. Featuring a sumptuous gallery of color illustrations demonstrating nature’s intricate... (more)