Note: This transcript of the episode was machine-generated and has not been edited for correctness. It's provided for your convenience when searching. Please excuse any errors.

[00:00:00] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): Nature has 3.8 billion years of evolution. So that's like 3.8 billion years of R and D that we could have as a library at our fingertips. What we're looking at is the best of the best that's around us. It's worth looking out to have as our mentors.

[00:00:19] welcome to innovation, no correctness, a podcast, all about innovation and transformation hosted by David Luna, author keynote speaker and founder of gamma digital and beyond David and his guests discuss real world practical advice on how to best harness the creativity of your employees and go from idea to product giving you unique perspectives and insights into their success.

[00:00:43] All while separating hype from reality and replacing bullshit. Bingo. With common sense, let's jump right into the show.

[00:00:52] Host (David C. Luna): Welcome back to another episode of the innovation or correctness podcast. In this episode, we talk about the best innovator

[00:01:00] on the planet bar, none nature and how we can learn and apply it's engineered solutions to solve some of the most challenging problems.

[00:01:08] We humans face explore some fascinating examples from the animal and insect kingdom. Yes. And see how successful companies have applied these nature inspired designs. Enter their products and fun fact, by the way, even though I studied business, I've always had an interest in this area and even wanted to do a PhD that looked at various strategies of different species in nature and try to develop new strategies for companies and apply those examples.

[00:01:35] My guest today is Jamie Dwyer. Jimmy Dwyer is a biomimicry research and design principle for biomimicry 3.8. She's also a certified biomimicry professional. Hunter a master's of science in biomimicry after earning degrees in biology and architecture, two seemingly very divergent fields that are actually perfectly suited through the practice of biomimicry as a

[00:02:00] project man and lead researcher for biomimicry 3.8, Jamie facilitates biomimicry in the built environment.

[00:02:06] What does that mean? she works to transform the design framework by helping designers apply biological intelligence derived from nature's forms, processes and systems. In addition, Jamie has served as a biologist at the design table for major clients like Kimberly Clark, Jacobs engineering, and many others.

[00:02:24] She also teaches biomimicry courses and workshops in San Francisco in Montana and has been a featured speaker at numerous events. So what are we going to talk about in this episode? what biomimicry and biomimetics actually is the best innovator on the planet nature and what makes us humans more like apprentices than masters?

[00:02:42] Some fascinating biomimicry, examples and applications, how companies can apply principles from nature to solve some of their most challenging problems. Concrete biomimicry projects and what types of results. One can expect a few misconceptions and over-hype areas of biomimicry and her

[00:03:00] top three recommendations for companies wanting to better leverage biomimicry in their products and so much more let's go meet Jamie.

[00:03:11] So a welcome to the podcast. Jamie, do you want to briefly introduce yourself to the

[00:03:16] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): listeners? Sure. So my name's Jamie Dwyer and I currently live in Montana in the United States. my background is in biology and in architecture and those two bits of education then led me to this career in biomimicry.

[00:03:33] So that's a little bit of my work history.

[00:03:35] Host (David C. Luna): So before we start using technical terms, would you mind explaining the term biomimicry and biomimetics and how that differs from Bionics? I assume most listeners haven't heard of the term before.

[00:03:47] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): Sure. Biomimicry is learning from, and then emulating nature could be forms, processes, or systems, and that emulation is all geared towards creating a

[00:04:00] more sustainable design.

[00:04:02] As far as I know, biomimicry and biomimetics is those are interchangeable words. of course there might be some people who have a more nuanced definition of one or the other, and separate them out. But I have heard people use those two words interchangeably as far as Bionics. I am not an expert in Bionics, but I would consider that it'd be a, sub biomimicry.

[00:04:24] It's very specific, more around emulating. Nature in electronics. So it's you, if you look up Bionics, you would see, robotic hands and stuff like that.

[00:04:35] Host (David C. Luna): Even if you term biomimicry is relatively new, it seems we, humans have always been fascinated by nature. If I just take flying, for instance, we tried to imitate birds.

[00:04:46] So when did we humans start imitating nature? Is there a record of that?

[00:04:51]Guest (Jamie Dwyer): I would say that humans probably first started imitating nature before we had any real records. all that would take would be for,

[00:05:00] caveman human, too, what other animals are eating and then copy that, that maybe that would be a.

[00:05:06] A first instance, but as we do biomimicry now, when we try to be really intentional, it's a proactive practice of looking to nature to solve problems.

[00:05:17] Host (David C. Luna): What are some examples or applications of biomimicry besides the famous example, such as Velcro or spider silk? Can you give us some examples that maybe are lesser known.

[00:05:30] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): We've got some smaller scale things. So Velcro like a product or spider silk. There's a large scale example, a whole different level there. The East gate building, which is a building in Zimbabwe designed by Mick Pearce. And it's a pretty cool building. I've never been there myself, but many case studies and research have been done on it.

[00:05:50] And Mick Pearce learned. About how termites in their termite mounds in Zimbabwe and other countries ventilation.

[00:06:00] And so his ventilation system has got a passive ventilation system in the East gate building that is mimicking what he learned from termite mounds. So part of what he looked at was, so these termites are farmers and the farm, rooms, you might call them are underground.

[00:06:15] And then there are systems of, basically chimneys and then they open and close, no different chimneys to then control the temperature and the humidity inside their farming areas.

[00:06:28] Host (David C. Luna): I could easily see some companies saying, that's easy enough. Let's just take a species or an organism and try to copy or emulate what they're doing and apply it to our problem that we're trying to solve.

[00:06:39] But almost always, it's not that easy. And I would assume that the abstraction level needed to apply these and extract these principles to a concrete. Problem can get quite complex. So how would a say a company that's trying to produce more efficient turbines? How would they start and where would they look?

[00:06:59]natures

[00:07:00] is very huge in common.

[00:07:01] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): Yeah. That's a good question. you just mentioned, one of the issues is the scale. So with the East gate building and, mimicking the termites, that's a different scale and in some cases that can be enlarged and still work. Yeah. You can imagine there are other strategies that are very dependent upon the scale that they happen in nature.

[00:07:23] Like for example, if you're moving water in a tree through capillary action, That can't be indefinitely, enlarged and still work. So it's a really good question. And the example that you mentioned, the turbines is actually an interesting example that already has a bit of a biomimicry story. So there is a company called whale power that has created a technology based off whale topicals, and.

[00:07:50] I guess that's a good example for me to talk about how someone or a company would go about it, about the process of biomimicry. So there we talk about

[00:08:00] there being two methods of doing, or I guess two approaches of doing biomimicry. So one of them would actually be this case study of whale power, this typical technology.

[00:08:10]That is going from biology to design. In this particular case, dr. Frank fish, who happens to be an expert in fluid dynamics, noticed what he thought was an error in this figurine of a humpback whale, the bumps or turnbuckles on the whale flipper. Weren't where he expected them to be based on his understanding of.

[00:08:31] Current fluid dynamics and how a whale would be moving through the water and be the most dynamic. And so he spent years and years studying the whale flipper and in wind turbines and creating models and really finding out the mechanics of what was happening. And then he took what he learned and applied it to wind turbines and got great benefits, decrease noise, and increase the generation energy generation across a greater range of wind speeds.

[00:08:59] So the.

[00:09:00] Wind turbine really is becoming more efficient. So this was all like an example of starting from inspiration, from nature, a, Oh aha. I discovered something and I want to learn about it. Got it. And then apply it to a design or a category or a industry where that might make sense. And you can even think of, okay, what other industries would benefit from this?

[00:09:24]understanding of fluid dynamics that we learned from the wheelchair buckle, so there might be other places where it could be he applied. So this is a biology starting with and then transporting it to design. And then the other way to go about doing biomimicry is what we call challenge to biology.

[00:09:40] So starting with yeah. Company and they have a problem. And then. Being very intentional on, honing that question down of what is it that we want this, maybe it's a product of what we want this product to do. take away my assumptions of what I think the end result is going to be, but really what do I want this product to do?

[00:09:58] And then I

[00:10:00] take that question and go look and see what I can find in nature and biomimicry 3.8. The company that I work for has been, I spent 20 years honing that process of how to then learn from the natural mentor and discover the strategy or the mechanism exactly what's happening there.

[00:10:21] And then I'm bringing that to the design process, to change the design and come up with something new or at least improved, that solves the original challenge. So two different ways of, coming towards biomimicry, the biomimicry process.

[00:10:36] Host (David C. Luna): Absolutely fascinating. I always found the best inventor in the world.

[00:10:40] Nature is so full of examples that we just need to tap into. So there's a lot of things I'd like to ask you and we could go down many rabbit holes. So what you described about honing the problem or the challenge sounds very much like. Design thinking where you would frame your design challenge.

[00:10:58] How do we improve

[00:11:00] wind turbines by 50% using nature or using a principle out of nature? It does that use design thinking. It's

[00:11:07] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): definitely the process that we go through to bring biomimicry to a design process. it's not outside of design thinking. It's just adds depth to various steps of a good design process.

[00:11:22] Host (David C. Luna): If we break this down even further, is there a systematic way of applying these principles from nature? And I thought about this without knowing how you guys approach it from my experience, is that something on a macroscopic level can behave very differently or look very differently. Then on a microscopic or even nano level.

[00:11:45] And this kind of reminds me of Alan Watts, where he talks about different perspective. There is no black or white or no good or bad, there's just different perspectives and you have different viewpoints. So if you take something,

[00:12:00] say for instance, at a microscopic levels, look at a picture that might like.

[00:12:05] Look like a bunch of dots, but if you look at under the naked eye, that looks like an actual picture. And if you look at something from the telescope, it looks very different and then you could ask, okay, what's the right magnification there. Isn't one. If I take, for instance, an Ann colony with the naked eye, it looks like chaos, but at another level it's could be complete.

[00:12:25] Harmony could look very orderly. From another view. So is there a systematic way of applying these principles and extracting these principles from nature?

[00:12:36] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): Oh, there's definitely a process that fair mimicry, 3.8 and partners that we've been working with have developed and are continued to hoe continuing to hone that.

[00:12:49] Help us be intentional and not miss steps and, and do a thorough job that being said, I wanted to talk about a couple of things that came to mind as you

[00:13:00] were talking. And, and that interesting quote about it's all about the perspective. Yes, the macro and the micro scale things work differently.

[00:13:09]at a water, for example, at a large scale, a body of water versus looking at a molecule of water and how it interacts with, another chemical or another water molecule. So at a chemistry level. So we definitely, part of it is getting the right expert to. Understand the natural world at the right scale.

[00:13:29]from an evolutionary biologist who is going to talk about how species are interacting and interacting with the environment and with each other or to a chemist, and, we have. we have a chemist on staff and we have people who are looking at nature at a more ecological level, ecosystem services and the outputs from an ecosystem as a whole.

[00:13:52] And so we definitely are looking at the appropriate scale and besides scale, we're also looking at.

[00:14:00] Nature on the level of, if it's a form that we're looking at. So like a three dimensional shape, like you mentioned, Velcro. So the hooks and how it hooked, and then what the other side looks like and how the hooks to each other, or could be processed.

[00:14:13]photosynthesis or how light is created and, bug or could be systems level as well. So how an ecosystem, all the different species, what they're just doing on there. daily living then creates an ecosystem that helps us manage flood water. So we're looking also at all of those different scales, but I have to say doing biomimicry research is so fun because it is about the perspective as you mentioned, and, say we have a challenge from a company and it has to do with managing excess water.

[00:14:46] Okay. So yeah, we're going to look at that perspective, that context of what, or some other creatures that live in a place that has. too much water, but then we might also look at it from the opposite side of that coin opposite perspective. How

[00:15:00] about the creatures that live in a place where water is very scarce and every drop of water is ho hard fought for, or, they have to, I don't know, have some special material or do something special in order to get every drop of water.

[00:15:15] And so that's also a valid. Context environmental system to look in. So it is hard to describe doing biomimicry to people because I don't know, it can seem so all over the board. Someone will ask me, Oh, you know what's the biomimicry? And I'm like, it's from chemistry to, master planning.

[00:15:35] So it can be anything and everything. So it is, it does make it hard to describe, but we have worked hard as a company to hone down. How we do biomimicry and creating tools for other people to do biomimicry as well. Yeah. And even the whole, like taxonomy of a function, I don't think I've mentioned function yet, but function is really though the bridge between biology and design.

[00:15:59] And

[00:16:00] when I talked earlier about it's honing down the design question of what do you want your project? Or, your, what do you want your design to do? And you asked also the good design process and, getting to the function as part of that good design process. And that really is the tool that we use to move back and forth between biology.

[00:16:17] And

[00:16:18] Host (David C. Luna): that's what I personally find very fascinating. And intriguing about nature. You see the solutions and you're like, wow, that's just so simple, so elegant. But then if you did it deeper and look at how the ocean is actually created, it's actually pretty complex, but nature has a solution and answer to everything.

[00:16:37] And that's what I found so fascinating about biomimicry.

[00:16:40] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): I agree. And one of the benefits of yeah, using biomimicry in a design process is that humans a lot of times humans will get stuck. And when we do a movie to invent a better know something, it's almost if we take the original version and try to

[00:17:00] improve upon it, And one of the great benefits of using nature or as a library of mentors that we can learn from is that plants provide a very different solution set then insects or, and mammals or, bacteria or, so there is such a wide variety.

[00:17:21] A very different solutions. So that just gives us such a, it's such a gift for us to be able to look at all of these different species that are doing things differently. And yes, sometimes species that are unrelated we'll do, we'll have a similar mechanism, a similar strategy. And that also is worth knowing that that a bird and an insect have evolved to have, similar.

[00:17:46] Ways of flying, and there are differences obviously, but there are some similarities and in both of those things are worth learning from.

[00:17:52] Host (David C. Luna): This reminds me of another observation. And I believe also Alan Watts said this in some form where he said the

[00:18:00] relationship in nature is actually transmit.

[00:18:03] So neither is the organism being pushed around by the environment, nor is the innovation airman being pushed around by the organism. So the relationship itself is it's actionable, similar, there's nobody. Buying if there's nobody selling an economics or there's no crest without a trough. I think we humans tend to miss this symbiotic relationship, this transactional relationship, and just see certain aspects of it.

[00:18:31] Okay. Hey, this is black. This is white. This is good. This is bad. And I think we do nature, a huge disservice and just tend to overlook a lot of these interesting aspects that could solve a lot of challenging problems that we have. But, that's just another observation that I just came up with.

[00:18:50] So what are some of the misconceptions people have about biomimicry?

[00:18:55]Guest (Jamie Dwyer): one of the misconceptions that people sometimes ask me about is that they think about

[00:19:00] Americans free is all about using creatures to do the task that's for us. And so for a lot of folks, that's a negative impression that, they imagine, I don't know that we've got spiders all, producing silk for us and we're using it for something or a, something like that.

[00:19:18] But. so that's a misconception about biomimicry, biomimicry early is about learning and then applying those design labs. another misconception is that the animal or, whatever this preacher is, has to like, has the same intent. As humans. And so then it seems, it might seem impossible to find a, an animal that's doing something for the same intention as what we might be using it for.

[00:19:45]and that reason exactly is why we use function to bridge between biology and design. It doesn't necessarily matter what the intent is. likely this creature is just trying to stay alive. And over evolutionary time, How has evolved this

[00:20:00] different, physical attribute or a behavior or something that then matches the system and provides it some benefits.

[00:20:07] So it doesn't have to be, we don't have to understand any sort of intent from the animal. Oh, another misconception is that, people think that it's going to be, like this iconic creature that then gets mimicked in all aspects. But of course, when you have a project that's as complex as a building, you're not gonna mimic just one thing.

[00:20:27] You might mimic a lot of things you might mimic, the East gate building, you might mimic the ventilation system from one creature and, a shading technology from the cactus, which Mick Pearce did use on the East gate building. And then, and another building, maybe I have other challenges as well.

[00:20:44] And they look to other creatures that are helping, that are, providing, a mentor for a knowledge, for a different challenge.

[00:20:51] Host (David C. Luna): Yeah, I think most people tend to forget that the animals or any species or organisms live within a certain context live within a certain

[00:21:00] environment and those attack or defense strategies make sense in that environment.

[00:21:05] If I take the Navien water beetle, for instance, that lives in the desert where w water's very scarce, but it can basically extract water. Out of thin air, literally, that makes sense in that environment. But if it live in the ocean, for example, water's abundant, that wouldn't make any sense. So we tend to often over rely on examples or rely on what you said, the iconic species or the iconic animal that we're going to use for everything.

[00:21:34] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): Yeah. When I've been working with students, they definitely get caught up with, they are mimicking the beetle. And so then they might try to force, some of the strategies from the beetle to fit with everything in their building. But of course that doesn't make sense, what the, what they're trying to produce as a design as much more complicated.

[00:21:53] And so then they have the opportunity. it's a great opportunity to then look. At other species and how other species are doing

[00:22:00] the next portion of the challenge that they need to work on.

[00:22:02] Host (David C. Luna): Yeah. There's a classical example of Maslow's hammer over the over Alliance on Thea tool. So if I had have a hammer and never used one, everything looks like a nail and that's okay to a certain extent, but sometimes I have to get over this.

[00:22:15] Okay. One principle doesn't apply to everything. Yeah, I totally get that. I think we're all kind of victims of that. When we first see a framework, a principle, then we'd like to apply it to everything. So are there maybe species, these plants, et cetera, or organisms or properties in nature that lend itself better to biomimicry or can one even say that.

[00:22:35]Guest (Jamie Dwyer): I think right now, as far as species that are lending themselves about mimicry, we're really just limited by what species have been researched. So there are a lot of species out there that we don't know anything about. And that's the limitation with being able to use them as a mentor is we just don't know anything yet.

[00:22:53] And, as we, as humans, are able to understand different natural processes and see

[00:23:00] things at a smaller scale and study at a smaller scale, so all of those new technologies that we might have and, better scientific studies, all of that kind of allows us to then those mentors are now available to us to use and learn from.

[00:23:15] Host (David C. Luna): So essentially it's a matter of cataloging, more and more species and the specific attributes. And I would say talents that these organisms have to then apply better solutions to the problems we're trying to solve.

[00:23:30] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): Yeah.

[00:23:30] Host (David C. Luna): So one principle I found particularly fascinating is permaculture and it's very similar to what's coming up or has been coming up in the last five years, which is circular economy.

[00:23:41] So permaculture trying to emulate nature because we humans, we produce something with brute force and then we use it and then it gets discarded and there's waste in a nature. There is no waste. It's transactional. Everything gets used and trying to apply this to. product development, product design, and

[00:24:00] doing something with that waste than that, we create that's still usable.

[00:24:04] So is that something you guys do as well is try to help companies think more in circular terms in circular economy?

[00:24:14] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): We do. you hit it exactly right. When you said that there is no waste in nature. there's no such thing as garbage, the outputs from one species or from one system, those then become the resources for something else.

[00:24:28] And so we definitely have done work with companies just to rethinking their food web of, where they're getting resources from and, not just their internal, production lines, but then, where are they getting resources from? And then where are their waste going to? So for example, we have done work with interface carpets, and they, as a company have done some interesting work with taking.

[00:24:53]waste quote, waste resources and turning it into material that they then use again to

[00:25:00] the point where they have developed their own machine that pulls the backing off carpet and then lets them reuse it as a sort of fresh resource.

[00:25:10] Host (David C. Luna): Can you maybe describe or take us through a biomimicry project that you were involved with in the past, and then show us what type of results one can achieve by taking principles from nature and applying those.

[00:25:23] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): Okay. my background is in architecture as well as biology. So a lot of the projects that I work on are built environment projects, and, some of the cool projects that we're working on now are all under this heading of project positive and what we're trying to do. Is to look to nature at a much larger scale than some of our other biomimicry work.

[00:25:47] So we're looking at how a healthy ecosystem, how L how healthy habitats function. And, there are many benefits that people get. From having, or being surrounded

[00:26:00] by healthy ecosystems, like flood management or, clean air, clean water, all of those types of resources and benefits that we get from being in a healthy, natural place.

[00:26:14] And so what we're trying to do with these up and coming. Built environment projects is to quantify what is it actually happening in an ecosystem, and then learning how it is happening, better understanding of how, what, what components are all required for, clean water and clean air.

[00:26:35] And. But, regulating stormwater, those kinds of benefits. And so then bringing not only the design ideas, but then also those metrics to a project. So changing the whole trajectory of a built environment project. And so we've been working on this on some various campuses and with some manufacturing companies.

[00:26:56] So that's the type of project that I ended up working on.

[00:27:00] And, then of course, biomimicry 3.8. The, we have my coworker who is a chemist and he's working on a whole different scale of projects. And then I have a note and another coworker whose background is in engineering. And, so then for those different scales, biomimicry 3.8 has worked on projects that are.

[00:27:18]like learning about packaging. So how leaves are, folded up in a little bud and then are deployed and, and then having that kind of strategy or that kind of a mechanism applied to rethinking their packaging or at a chemistry level. How nature has these really specific chemistries that are, the key to the lock and not the way that we bludgeon our way through a lot of chemists.

[00:27:51] And so to change those processes for how a chemical company creates their chemicals instead of, so an, a much more specific

[00:28:00] and targeted way mimicking nature. So those are the types of projects that we're working on.

[00:28:05] Host (David C. Luna): And what type of results do the customers generally get?

[00:28:09] Is it like, Oh, it was an interesting project. It was 5% better than our traditional way of doing things or is it like, wow, this is groundbreaking saved like 20%, 30% of the cost or is 30% more efficient. What is some of the feedback you guys get in these projects?

[00:28:25]Guest (Jamie Dwyer): real life projects are of course complicated.

[00:28:27]we've had great results where, it changes the way that a master plan is for a whole project to, and it changes the way that the thinking is and the intention is for the project. So some of those reasons that we get are harder to measure, but they are just steeped into the entire project and it has changed the way and the goals of the project.

[00:28:47] Other times, it's a new product. Other times it is, has been, some patents that have come Milan, one of the things that, that could also come out of it is that right nature. Doesn't do

[00:29:00] whatever that's challenges. And, maybe instead of taking another 10 years to attempt to find a solution, We just need a whole different approach.

[00:29:08] So sometimes the, there are very specific outcomes. there is a new product on the shelf, and sometimes it's just a whole different way of thinking that maybe doesn't really have much outcome at all on the first project. But the design team is forever looking at design in a different way and, just changes their company.

[00:29:28] So it's, it's a wide variety of results that we get for sure.

[00:29:33] Host (David C. Luna): Yeah, that makes total sense. So you mentioned patents just shortly. So if you want, I'm going to use the word, steal a patent from nature. Who does it belong to? So if you apply a principle or see a principle in nature, apply that to your product.

[00:29:48] I think I already know the answer, but I'm just going to ask because, it's actually stealing from nature or something. Freely available if one would just look, but then if companies applied, can they patent that this principle?

[00:30:00]

[00:30:00]Guest (Jamie Dwyer): I, we had a, a student who was taking some of our biomimicry classes at one point, who was a patent lawyer.

[00:30:06]I am not that. Much of an expert with all of those details. I do know that you can't patent what, what a frog is doing. And so it has to be a step further than that. You have to distill out the mechanism. And then, I think apply it to whatever your design is or whatever your industry is in some sort of more specific way before you can pound it.

[00:30:30] That is my understanding, but that's not my area of expertise.

[00:30:34] Host (David C. Luna): So it's best not to Pat and Kermit the frog because they'll Sue you

[00:30:40] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): exactly well. And, in the way that we work as a company, even just then reusing those mechanisms and strategies. And so our kind of rule of thumb is that we don't then.

[00:30:52] Give that strategy or that mechanism for how a species, moves water or whatever it might

[00:31:00] be. So we're not going to give that same water moving strategy to another company that does the same thing as the company mean we were working for when we did that research. So we'll at least have to be.

[00:31:13] A company that is in a field that is so different that no one would even really recognize it as being the same solution because it's applied to something so different. we're not trying to do research for, one food company and then turn around and then give that research to another food company.

[00:31:30]though it would be great if we had, partnerships between all of those companies so that they could, together further the research and. and I guess make a larger change, but we haven't yet worked in that kind of a scenario

[00:31:44] Host (David C. Luna): on the flip side. Are there some things that are over-hyped in biomimicry or that are overused?

[00:31:50] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): A lot of companies do want that. I conic species to be the species. That that then they can talk about, and it's a, puts

[00:32:00] on a good narrative and is, looks good on pictures and that kind of thing. So we have run into that before. For example, this law in some countries is that's like not, it's not very good.

[00:32:15] Implication. It's like implying that it's lazy or, there's a connotation to the species of sloths that is all negative. And we've been on projects where we're, we're Oh, this law is so cool. And we can learn these things from they're like, no. That's like bad.

[00:32:32] Publicity and, the bad connotation. I think they're not that's like being over-hyped, but the opposite. It's they almost expect it to be like, the model that they're going to put out there for their successes when, really as the researchers, we're just trying to find the best examples.

[00:32:51] So that's a little bit of opposite of where you're asking, but it's a funny way that it happens.

[00:32:55] Host (David C. Luna): Yeah, this is what I call either. It's greenwashing, or I call it in a way

[00:33:00] washing when people say, Hey, look, we're really creative. We're using design thinking and thinking just because of using it method, then you're automatically created or associating something with the Slav.

[00:33:11] I'm automatically lazy. Instead of really wanting to create a sustainable future or whatever you're trying to solve. So that's what I call innovation washing. Just trying to say, Hey, look, we're green too. We recycle our trash. So look at us. We're completely green instead of really. Taking it to the next level and really practicing what you preach.

[00:33:31] So I get that in a lot of companies,

[00:33:32] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): I think, yeah, that's much more, that's much more articulate than what I was trying to say. And I think you're right that, some of the aspects of biomimicry that get over-hyped as that, just by saying that you're doing biomimicry, and that greenwashing way, then it's like automatically doing a more sustainable and better job.

[00:33:50] And of course it's possible to. Mimic something from nature and then, apply it to something that's very harmful to the rest of the world. So I think there is that aspect

[00:34:00] of environment McCurry, where it's automatically good because it's coming from inspiration from nature. But of course that's in the designer's hands, how they put it to work.

[00:34:09]yeah.

[00:34:10] Host (David C. Luna): This reminds me of propellers, which is a mixture of bee wax, the saliva of bees and the tree SAP resin, which is used for multiple purposes. But one of the main reasons why behind users is the key microbes out. So propels has antiviral, antibacterial and antifungal properties. And the interesting part is no two propose ingredients are the same because.

[00:34:36] Again, B highs differ from each other and they always have different trees where they collect the SAP, which in turn means again, that you have no drug resistance for propolis, which makes it very interesting. But when you look at us humans, Oh, we're so proud of our drugs and our pharmaceutical industry that can produce drugs in the same quality.

[00:34:56] So on to a certain extent, that makes sense. And I get why, but

[00:35:00] we tend to forget the big advantages. Of biodiversity or creating something that's very different from each product that is produced.

[00:35:11] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): We've run into that exact conundrum in other projects. And, that's one of the reasons that I really love doing biomimicry is that.

[00:35:20] Just, it changes your mind, the way you think about things all the time. I've mentioned interface before, and one of our first projects with them, it took on that same aspect of how humans are so obsessed with making things so perfect. And so when they were making carpets, you can imagine as the carpets all going by and they have quality control, it's all looking for this, Oh, you're looking for a little error in, you want the whole.

[00:35:45] Thing to be as similar and the same as possible. And one of our first projects was that with them was just looking at how nature does, how coverings are in nature. And so if you imagine walking through a forest in a deciduous

[00:36:00] forest in the fall, and all the leaves are on the ground, you look ahead and it's, each leaf is different and it's, if you look at a, a S a square of the floor covering, it's not exactly the same.

[00:36:12] And yet. The look of it is, Oh, you can't really tell that there's a different square that, it's all it's so different that it's the same. and so that idea is one of the ideas that they then and their carpet design. So with their carpet squares, having carpet that each tile is different.

[00:36:31] And yet when you lay the tiles down, it's you can't tell where one ends and one begins.

[00:36:37]Host (David C. Luna): that reminds me so much of biodiversity and why nature heavily relies on biodiversity. We humans, we have these huge monocultures of one crop, and then we're like, Oh, the whole crop is destroyed because one insect specializes on this one specific crop.

[00:36:54]duh, if you just use one crop instead of multiple ones, And diversify your portfolio,

[00:37:00] which we humans do understand, but when it comes to nature, we want to standardize and scale everything. And a lot of companies, they have this obsession about scalability, or we need the business model to be scalable.

[00:37:13] And it's all about technology. And companies tend to forget in order for something to be scalable, you need to be able to automate it. And in order to automate it needs to be standardized. And if something is standardized, it's more easily imitated. But then when I ask companies, Oh, that's the exact opposite.

[00:37:30] What you actually want. You want to have a differentiating factor. And if you always rely on technology and always have this obsession about scalability, then you'll be like that monoculture, you'll have one event which will wipe you out instead of relying on some things that aren't scalable, things that are not scalable are.

[00:37:49] Mostly also hard to do. They're hard to imitate and that's it exactly what one would actually want. But again, most companies just rely on scalability. That's sad to see that we humans try

[00:38:00] to, I don't know, standardize everything and make it conform to our

[00:38:04] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): views. Yeah, there's a lot. There are a lot of lessons to be learned from nature at a larger scale.

[00:38:11] One of the tools that we use doing biomimicry is that we're not just looking at how the visual species or even how a single system. How we can learn from that and how that can be used as a model or, but we also look at life's principles. So w what are these common patterns of what all of the species around us are doing and, ideas like multi-functionality and.

[00:38:36] What we talked about earlier, that there is no waste that it's circular and that some waste for something as a resource for something else and how nature is modular and nested and how you know. So there are all of these principles that are at a global that are a good tool pair with what we learned from individual species.

[00:38:55] Cause I think it keeps us honest as far as the big picture of

[00:39:00] sustainability and. Okay. doesn't let us get so focused on, like a monoculture and, repeating the perfect thing. But, cause that goes against some of these life's principles that are more about resilience and having things be distributed.

[00:39:14] And so I think the pairing of life's principles with what individual species are doing as for strategies and mechanisms is a really helpful and a holistic way to go about

[00:39:25] Host (David C. Luna): doing design. You just mentioned resilience and that's important when you're in a very volatile and uncertain environment, which we live in, which we've always lived in, but believe the last 50 years was a little more plannable and then a strategy like that could make sense and make sense to a certain extent.

[00:39:41] But now that we, all of a sudden have something that's called coronavirus, you would. I think that we've finally understood the principle of resilience and diversity. And, but maybe I missed this Corona pandemic. Is there something we can learn from viruses or bacteria

[00:39:58] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): back to the life's principles that I

[00:40:00] was just talking about?

[00:40:01]just being as a, I'm in the U S so as a country, being able to be prepared for such a thing and cutting back the resources, that way we. it might need in the future because it's not the most efficient at the current time, And so then that gets us into a spot where we're not prepared to, respond to something that's new, like coronavirus and, learning from bacteria and viruses.

[00:40:27] Yes. I have done some interesting work on mutualisms.

[00:40:32] Host (David C. Luna): Can you briefly explain what that is to the listeners?

[00:40:35] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): Oh yeah. Mutualisms are, when species are working together. and there are different kinds of mutualisms. There are mutualisms where both partners benefit there are, there are also, parasitism where one of the species is gaining from the other and the other one is having a, getting a negative effect.

[00:40:55]and so it's just, it's really studying the. relationships between

[00:41:00] species. And so there are some species that have, that are dependent upon their hosts for them sample. And so learning about how mutualisms happen under what conditions what are the contexts, no, necessarily want to know exactly how you know, that crab and that CNN enemy have their relationship on a no, maybe about what types of benefits, One is getting from the other.

[00:41:24] And is it, the same kind of benefits or is it different? And part of what I learned while I was doing that research was about humans and the, the bacteria that we have on us all the time. And so it's, and so it was interesting. It was super interesting to learn about that. What causes a staph infection like that might be on us all the time.

[00:41:45] And as long as we can keep our bodies healthy, then maybe that partnership is beneficial for both of us. But as soon as. Something goes wrong and my skin is damaged or my system is compromised. Then, that partner that was a beneficial

[00:42:00] partner to me then can turn into a parasite and damage me further.

[00:42:04]and so there are really interesting things that we can learn at that scale. And just about the relationships, on that same topic. the, of the viruses and the bacteria, how, I don't know. I just, I would like to learn more about, are they getting pushed out of other places, patients because of something that humans are doing that is then, giving them this different opening and spreading in a way that we haven't seen before, or, creating this virus that we haven't seen before.

[00:42:29]more of the context, as well, but, and then in the U S maybe I also need to be studying. Roots and root networks on, sharing resources and moving resources to where they're needed. Cause of course, we're having a big problem with not having ventilators where we need them unnecessarily and, and people needing supplies and things needing to be right, moved around the country in an, in a kind of organized way.

[00:42:51] Host (David C. Luna): Yeah, absolutely. I think that's a fascinating field. there's so many avenues. One could go down there, even startups in the last few years that provide like soaps that

[00:43:00] these are based on microorganism that you just put on your skin and you don't have to wash yourself with soap. And it basically creates this balance on your skin and working with your gut biome and things like that.

[00:43:13]that's huge potential and I believe in the Russians have experimented with packing the, I dunno, sixties or seventies. With bacteria FEGS I think that's so cool. I'm not as attack vectors, but as delivery systems. So they use bacteria as a delivery system for certain treatments, and they've done that, decades ago.

[00:43:31] And I always find that fascinating, something that can be so harmful to us humans can be so useful.

[00:43:37] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): Yeah, that's an interesting, that's an interesting, I guess maybe you would say misconception about biomimicry to another question that we talked about earlier. that, I think a lot of times people think that other species are, good or bad or viruses are bad or, bacteria are bad.

[00:43:52]but it's much more complicated than that. the relationship that we have with our own bacteria is, in our gut biome

[00:44:00] and all of that, as you mentioned. but then just being able to look past that, stereotype look past that stereotype and, see what's what that bacteria is doing and what that could be applied to.

[00:44:14] So that's the fun part of biomimicry is that, you learn all sorts of interesting things. we've done projects where we learn about ticks and most humans are not, I don't like tips

[00:44:26] Host (David C. Luna): like me

[00:44:28] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): and including me there. I don't know one species that I really don't like at all. And yet they do some pretty interesting things about, we could learn from them about how to gather water out of the air and.

[00:44:41]a lot of interesting things that, strategies and mechanism that a tick is doing that we could learn from, even though, I, yes, I wouldn't even really say they're misunderstood cause I don't like to explain it, but there's certainly things that we can be learning from them.

[00:44:56] Host (David C. Luna): Absolutely. So I believe your, company, founder,

[00:45:00] Jeanine. She talks about how we, humans are a very young species and this kind of quote spoke to me and that we should be more apprentices to nature. And that's something I try to convey to companies explaining that we should actually be much more humble and start appreciating nature as like the ultimate.

[00:45:18] Innovator and master of innovation, instead of, solely focusing on technology and that's the only solution. So my question is that I have to use, why do you think we humans believe we're always superior and above nature and try to alter it and subjugate nature to our will instead of taking a more humble approach to this and appreciate nature for its beauty and for its solution to it has in store for us.

[00:45:41]Guest (Jamie Dwyer): my guess is that humans, on the timescale of the earth, humans have been along for just a little blip of the timescale. And I think that our thinking of being superior comes from the fact that we are making decisions and making changes so quickly and a lot of. The

[00:46:00] evolution around us is happening at such a different time scale.

[00:46:04] That it's, I haven't noticed it yet. It's not as obvious. And so I think in the past, so we have really dismissed it. And to the point where as humans, we have really separated ourselves from nature in many places. And see ourselves as separate and a lot of the work that we do with biomimicry. Sure. A part of it is to be inspired by nature and these creatures around us.

[00:46:28] But part of the work that we do is also to reconnect people to nature. And we're not going to see the creatures around us as being mentors. If first of all, they're not even. There are for us to see. and so it's, one of the benefits that Janine talks about is that nature has 3.8 billion years of evolution.

[00:46:48] So that's like 3.8 billion years of R and D that, we could have as a library at our fingertips. and so there's in biomimicry. We're really trying to see that long timescale and

[00:47:00] what's happened over all of those billions of years as a. A benefit that, what we're looking at is the best of the best that's around us.

[00:47:07] And yeah, it's worth looking at, to have, as our mentors. I think

[00:47:11] Host (David C. Luna): that was the most eloquent explanation I've ever heard for that question. And I think that really comes down to if I take climate change, for instance, because the timelines of our change and the results of our impact that we have in the environment.

[00:47:28] Are so far stretched apart that we don't make a connection between now we're blowing CO2 into the environment. I'm not experiencing any huge negative impact it's right now, or next week or next month or next year that could take decades. And so therefore I don't make the connection, the causality between my actions now and the results later on.

[00:47:51] So the farther apart these timelines are the harder it is, I think for us humans to make that connection. And I think. In a sense we're wired that way, but we still do

[00:48:00] have a prefrontal cortex that we can use to make some more or less rational decisions. So w what are some organisms, or what is your favorite organism that inspires you the most?

[00:48:13]Guest (Jamie Dwyer): the individual species changes all the time. I'm always doing research and I like to say geek out over whatever I am researching at the time. I just researched some about how leaves fold and are deployed and that's amazing. And. but I do love birds. And so some of my favorite all time, favorite species are birds.

[00:48:35] I began my biology work doing bird research. birds always have a, a special place that I'm always excited to see birds and learn about what they do and how they do it and their forms. And so

[00:48:48] Host (David C. Luna): I think you're a cat agrees,

[00:48:52] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): probably

[00:48:52] Host (David C. Luna): To summarize this interview. What are your top three recommendations for companies wanting to better leverage biomimicry

[00:49:00] or leverage the principles from nature for their products and services?

[00:49:04]Guest (Jamie Dwyer): I think that one thing is that idea of. Really thinking about what you want your product to do, not what you want to be. So not thinking about what the solution is, that's already in your mind, but really thinking about what you need this product to do. Sometimes it's surprising and really changes the way that you're thinking about the project in general.

[00:49:23]and and that's just good design practice, but it really opens the door for then practicing biomimicry. I think the second thing I would say would be to work with a scientist and, biologist, or, maybe at whatever scale your project is, the chemist is the right person to be working with.

[00:49:39] But someone who is able to search nature, with your team and open those doors to the biology for you. And then the third thing would be just to get outside and reconnect with nature yourselves as a team, just, there's something so important about reconnecting and, being able to be out there and

[00:50:00] enjoy those.

[00:50:01] I feel like benefits of, clean air and. And letting your body slow down. And as humans, our bodies and our, our eyes and, we, we react to being out in nature. So there is a, a visceral response, but then also it allows you to be in a context where, you can start thinking about your design in a different way and seeing how things work around you in an ecosystem and, maybe have your own discovery.

[00:50:28] Host (David C. Luna): Those are some excellent recommendations. Do you also have some books or resources people could tap into that are really interested in this topic?

[00:50:37] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): So I would start with Janine's book that biomimicry innovation inspired by nature. It's I guess, 21 years old at this point, but still a great intro into learning about what biomimicry is.

[00:50:50]there's a more textbook kind of book that I actually had the, the fortune to be part of. Writing biomimicry resource handbook. So that's a

[00:51:00] biomimicry resource handbook, seed bank of best practices. And that is really walking people through the methodology that we practice at biomimicry 3.8. And there are certainly.

[00:51:13]many other books that, you know, or have biomimicry in the title or in the name, or, Obama, medics, or some of these books don't even, mention it like that, but really are about learning from nature. So there are quite a few books out there. I'm pretty sure that we have a.

[00:51:31] A list of book resources on our website, but, and then also you mentioned training. And so then, biomimicry 3.8. we have a joint venture with Arizona state university, and so then have formed the biomimicry center. And there is a lot of online coursework that's taught through Arizona state university.

[00:51:49] We also have one week workshops. and then, our. A sister organization, the biomimicry Institute also holds workshops and they have a lot of resources also for

[00:52:00] teachers, a biomimicry educators network that they have. And then they also have asked nature, which has a, a database that's online that people can use to like you would type in the function.

[00:52:10] So how does nature, manage water? So you could type in manage water and then, different resources and examples and strategies and stuff would come up. And so they are continuously adding to that and getting funding to, more resources. And, I know they're awhile back. They even added a bunch of chemistry resources.

[00:52:29] So there is a lot in there and they also have some case studies in there. Yeah. So there's quite a bit of. There are quite a few resources that are to be found. There are also even regional networks that are where there are people who, live in a close geographic area to each other who are trying to get up local biomimicry movement going.

[00:52:48] So there are quite a few resources.

[00:52:50] Host (David C. Luna): Yeah, I'll be sure to include those resources in the show notes. And if people want to get in touch with you, how would they best contact you?

[00:52:57]Guest (Jamie Dwyer): emailing me is really easy.

[00:52:59]Host (David C. Luna): I guess

[00:53:00] this concludes this episode then thanks Janine for being on the podcast. It was a very insightful and I could've gone on for hours, but I want to obviously be respectful of your time.

[00:53:09] So thanks again for being on the podcast.

[00:53:12] Guest (Jamie Dwyer): I appreciate it. I had fun discussing all of these things with you.

[00:53:16] Host (David C. Luna): Wow, what a fascinating interview I could have gone on for hours. When I first started this podcast, I knew I had to do an, a podcast episode about biomimicry and another fun fact. My diploma thesis was about the critical analysis of economic and ecological management.

[00:53:33] Essentially looking at why this is not a contradiction between the two sciences, quite the contrary. And if you want to maximize profits over generations, then you have to think long range and are actually forced to create a sustainable business. And if you look up the word economics in a German dictionary, it defines it as a science of managing.

[00:53:56] Scarce resources. And the example I like to

[00:54:00] cite is take a fish pond. Say you have limited number of fish in that Ponzi 100. Now, if you want to make a really good profit in one day, you will fish them all out. And, you have a good payday, but that wouldn't be a sustainable oversee a week or a month. So you take out just the right amount so they can regenerate.

[00:54:18] This is why German SMEs that are family owned. Think in generations. They don't think to the next quarter, but they think in generations, so how can we make profits not 10 or 20 or 50 years, but for multiple generations to enjoy. So they're actually much more sustainable. They think very different. So they make decisions and manage the company in a very different manner that might not make the most profit right now.

[00:54:45] But on longterm, it does. Now let me ask you a rhetorical question. When you're trying to solve a very complex or one of the most pressing problem of our time, who would you trust someone with 200,000 years of experience or someone with

[00:55:00] 3.8 billion years of proven innovation? Prowess nature has been around for 3.8 billion years and knows very well what works and what doesn't not only that it has also perfected these processes and products over billions of years.

[00:55:13] And we humans I've just been around for a small blip of this. Yeah, we primitive apes. How nature would probably call us that barely learned to walk yesterday. They are so arrogant and cocky, but haven't even understood a fraction of what nature has to offer nor fully understood. It's ingenious design.

[00:55:31] Sure. We've developed high-speed digital fiber optic technology, the great wall of China, China traveled to the moon and yeah, that's quite impressive for a bunch of monkeys. But at the same time we rape and pillage the planet. there's no tomorrow we not only need to start reconnecting with nature as Jamie, Amended, but also take a more respectful and humble attitude towards them. Master of innovation by being more observant apprentices, rather than masters. I also want to say three examples of

[00:56:00] biomimicry and go into a little more detail so you can see how much potential nature has. So the first example is the issue concern or the 500 series of chickens and to be exact.

[00:56:11] And I mentioned this briefly in the episode, she, Canton is a Japanese bullet train and use biomimicry to reduce energy consumption and noise levels. Oh. While increasing its passenger comfort level. So the more streamline Shinkansen 500 series has a very streamlined forefront and a few structural adaptations to significantly reduce noise resulting from aerodynamics in high speed.

[00:56:36] Trains the train, not only travels, much more quietly. It also travels 10% faster and uses 15% less electricity. So how did this all come about? who was an engineer with gr West and was also an avid birdwatcher used his knowledge of the splash lists, water entry of King fishers, and silent flight of owls to decrease the sound generated by the trains.

[00:56:59] The

[00:57:00] kingfishers beak has an almost ideal shape for such an impact. The beak is streamlined steadily increasing in diameter from its tip to its head. This also reduces the impact as the King Fisher, essentially wedges its way into the water, allowing the water to flow. Or past the beak rather than being pushed in front of it.

[00:57:18] And trains face the same challenge moving from low drag open air to high drag air in the tunnel. So this designer designed the forefront of the Shinkansen train based on the beak of the King Fisher. This is very similar to the way of the owls primary feathers have serrations and create small vortices instead of one single large one.

[00:57:39] Now the bullet shaped nose was part of the problem. Another source of the noise was the pentagram, the protrusion that extends above the train to receive electricity from the wires above and here to the engineers, used models from nature, like the owl and penguins as well. And the second example I want to cite is

[00:58:00] sharkskin so Speedo, a producer of swimmer and notoriously incorporated bio medics.

[00:58:05] Sharkskin into a line of swimsuits for the 2008 Olympics. And according to the Smithsonian, 98% of the metals at the 2008 Olympics were won by swimmers wearing the sharkskin swimwear. And since then, the technology has also been banned in Olympic competition. So sharks can also has. antibacterial plastic surfaces or used on door handles in hospital restaurants and other high traffic areas because the skin of sharks, surprisingly don't have any parasites carrier due to the nature of the shark skin.

[00:58:39] The company that produces it. It's called chocolate technology and ships have also used truck skin from the apex predator. Lufthansa has also completed a research project back in, I believe, 2016 to develop a new coat. I think technology that promises to cut fuel consumption for Lufthansa's fleet that would generate

[00:59:00] savings of upward of 55 million euros worth of kerosene and more than 200,000 tons of CO2 every year.

[00:59:08] And the third example, I want to cite our colors and we think of paint. We often believe it must contain some type of pigment or harmful chemicals in order for us to great color. Now, nature can actually color without any chemistry at all, simply by using structures and playing with light and it produces colors that are much more vibrant and never fade.

[00:59:30] To sum this up. I think by being adaptable today has never been more crucial. I think we can all agree on that. And when asking how to be more adaptable, there's no better role model than nature. Nature has been successful for billions of years. And by the way, it's still around from design chemistry, processes or ecosystem.

[00:59:52] Nobody's. Better at it than the most successful and accomplished innovator on the planet. Nature uses sunlight for fuel. We humans use [01:00:00] toxic fuels. Cough also fuels nature uses water as its primary solvent. We humans use very toxic solvent nature and all its organisms understand their environment, its limits and opportunities.[01:00:12] Nature. Isn't aware of anything. That's called waste. Everything is a resource. That gets upcycled by another species in its ecosystem. And one thing species also don't do is shit in their own home. We humans. On the other hand, we pollute our own drinking water. And as Janine, then you said, if we humans want to stay around for the next 200,000 years and thrive while we're at it, we need to start emulating nature, sustainable model.[01:00:39] For nature. Success is keeping its offspring alive for thousands, some generations, but we can't be there for the next generation. So the only way for us to achieve this is to take care of the environment the organism is in and insurance. The environment takes care of the offspring nature creates conditions where life can thrive.[01:00:58] So let's start learning and [01:01:00] let the healing begin. As Goodwill hunting said.