ANDRZEJ KRAUZEIt’s August and deep into summer. Along the Atlantic coast, reports of shark attacks and stinging jellyfish invasions have beachgoers wary. The wildly popular but infamous Discovery Channel series Shark Week just concluded, stoking its usual quota of irrational fear, even though this year’s programming did include some more nods to actual science. Sharks aren’t just fodder for sensationalist filmmakers: how they and other marine creatures live in their watery world has fed the imaginations of biomedical engineers looking to design better medical techniques and products by mimicking nature.
In this issue’s cover story (“Inspired by Nature”), Daniel Cossins describes how shark-skin denticles inspired the construction of antibacterial surfaces; how jellyfish tentacles influenced the design of a technique for snagging rare cancer cells circulating in the bloodstream; how mussel proteins that harden underwater to attach the mollusks to rocks can serve as an effective surgical glue; and other amazing examples of biomimicry.
Nature plays muse to all scientists and still harbors many a secret in need of decoding.
Of course, nature plays muse to all scientists and still harbors many a secret in need of decoding. In the field of developmental biology, the unique and largely unexplored functional properties of an unusual (and transient) organ is the subject of “The Prescient Placenta,” by Christopher ...
