Check out the latest episode of The Uncommon Engineer podcast in the player above.
Engineers can learn a lot from the animal kingdom.
“The very first role models for us mechanical engineers and fluid mechanists were birds and fish,” says David Hu, professor of mechanical engineering at Georgia Tech. “Basically, nature's way to move around in fluids. These animals have been an inspiration for hundreds of years, but recently there are technologies like high-speed cameras, 3D printing and 3D scanning that we can use and actually start to really figure out how these animals are doing these amazing things. And then when we look at these animals, we are hoping that we can use the principles that we see to design new kinds of devices.”
In the latest episode of The Uncommon Engineer, David Hu talks about animals – more specifically, how we can solve complex human problems by studying animal functions.
Can timing urination of an elephant and a human impact engineering? How exactly do snakes move without legs? How can some spiders seemingly walk on water? Why are tigers’ tongues so efficient at grooming fur? Finding the answers to questions like these can inform how we engineer new technologies.
David Hu is an Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Biology (as well as an Adjunct Associate Professor of Physics) in Georgia Tech's George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering where he leads the Hu Biolocomotion Lab at Georgia Tech.