Nature's use Full designs

and engineering meet. B Perhaps the best example of biomimetics is Velcro. In 1948 a Swiss scientist, George de Mestral, had trouble removing a plant's prickle which was stuck to his god's fur, so he studied it under a microscope. Impresses by the stickiness of the prickle's hooks, he copied the design, engineering a fastener made of two pieces. One piece has stiff hooks like the prickly, while the other has soft loops that allow the hooks to stick. De Mestral named his invention Velcro- a combination of words "velour" and "crochet" C Andrew Parker, a research fellow at the natural History Museum in London and at the University of Sydney, is a leading proponent of biomimetics- applying designs from nature to problems in engineering, materials science, medicine, and other fields. He has investigated iridescence in butterflies and beetles and antireflective coatings in month eyes- studies that have led to brighter screens for cellular phones and an anticounterfeiting technique so secret he cannot say which company is behind it. He is working to make cosmetics that mimic the natural sheen of diatoms (a type of algae) and, with the British Ministry of Defense to emulate the water- repellent properties of these same…