Biomimicry and BioEngineering

Last weekend, my 10-year-old intern, Samuel and I were building out the biodome at Mezzacello Urban Farm. We wanted to cover the structure with mesh and then hardware cloth to protect animals from escaping and predators getting in. We were flummoxed by the door though, how could we make a door that maintained structural stability and still worked? That’s when Samuel mentioned bioengineering and biomicry.

What is Biomimcry?

Biomimicry is when you copy an attribute of nature to create a new application for that natural feature. In this case, Samuel had been looking at a duck’s wings and how they cleaned themselves. He noticed that the bird could hing the wing at two spots on it’s breast and at the neck. But the trailing edge would just slide out of the way.

Samuel suggested that we enter the biodome the same way the duck got it’s head under and through the wing. So we mocked it up with zip ties and netting, and it worked! A simple and elegant solution that when locked in place provides great structural stability to the dome as well.

Metal on Metal

Now we have the three hinges in place on the door that Samuel designed. One steel screw clamp at the top left of the door, one steel screw clamp at the bottom left of the door, and one steel screw clamp at the top left where the door meets the door jamb. After this, we had to make one more modification to make the door really function like a wing.

All the bolts throughout the entire structure are steel bolts on steel pieces of the geodesic dome. But for the door to flex inward without resistance we needed a more flexible and forgiving material. So we opted for a big silicone gasket with a locking top to it.

The silicone allows the right middle side of the door to flex out and up and entrance is easily made beneath the wind of the duck. Now we just need to add a series of locks to the part of the door that meets the first angle transition of the biodome and we are set. I am pretty proud of Samuel and pleased with the elegant simplicity of his design.