Bio-inspired Adaptive Building Skins - Biotechnologies and Biomimetics for Civil Engineering - page 117

Material Component Facade Whole building

FORM

FUNCTION

PROCESS

Fig. 5.1 Overview of bio-inspiration at different levels

Initial manifestations of biomimetic applications in the construction sector were
mainly focused on individual buildings and experimental architecture. More and
more, however, efforts now tend to shift to the level of materials and components,
henceforth aiming at easier repeatability and wider applicability (Loonen et al.
2014 ). Figure 5.1 provides an overview of the different scales and function levels
at which bio-inspired adaptable facade design is examined in this chapter.
From the level of the building envelope, bio-inspiration can take place at
various different spatial scales, ranging from (i) material, (ii) component, (iii)
façade, to (iv) whole-building. Following biomimetic literature, the types of bio-
inspiration can be classified in one of the following three groups, (a) form, (b)
function, and (c) process (Pedersen Zari 2010 ).
Form is the most straightforward type of bio-inspired design, because it directly
relates to imitation of the morphological appearance of the biological system or
organism. There is a clear visual resemblance between the building envelope and
its biological equivalent, but it does not necessarily embody a functional feature
that has a positive effect on performance of the building, and if it performs a
function, it is not associated with the original application. Although out of scope
and hence not presented in this chapter, many examples of non-adaptive bio-
inspired structures, such as organism-shaped or zoomorphic architecture (Alder-
sey-Williams 2004 ) fit into this category.
Function, on the other hand, mimics the underlying biological mechanism, i.e.
it tends to be more concerned with what the facade does rather than the way it
looks (although not completely excluding similarity in terms of form). Functional
bio-inspiration can either be direct or indirect. The first approach directly copies
the observed functional principle into a building envelope technology which
performs the same role. The indirect approach is loosely based on a selected
biological principle, but requires an intermediate abstraction step in the transfer
from biological principle to building envelope technology.
Process, the third type of bio-inspiration, is an important constituent in many
features of biomimicry. However, it is not commonly found on the level of
individual buildings, but more often in inter-building connections on the urban or
district scale. It is therefore not part of the analysis presented in this chapter.