Nature and Design

Project Type: Individual (Coursework)
Activities: Exploring design inspired by nature, Biomimicry in innovation, Perspective drawing, Creative expression
Tools: Pencils, Colour Pencils

Background:

  • During the FLAME Scholars Program (FSP), I undertook a course named Nature and Design

  • The course focused on design inspired by the simplicity of nature and aimed to help students integrate characteristics observed in nature into designs of products and systems

Below are some of my explorations of nature-inspired design:

Stick Insect Mutation - The activity required me to understand the stick insect’s body structure and its characteristics and mutate the insect into an object of daily use. The daily object that I chose to mutate the insect into was a wrist watch and the characteristics I was inspired by are the light weight of the stick insect and its ability to cling to surfaces. This exercise was meant to be purely exploratory without functional analysis.

BioStride - Artificial Sensation Redefined:

Understanding the Stick Insect:

(A preliminary understanding of the structure and characteristics of a Stick Insect. On the left bottom corner is an attempt to use the characteristics of a stick insect to convey a message)

Problem:

Use the characteristics of a chosen animal or plant (stick insect), and create or modify a functional product to solve a problem

  • Chosen product - Prosthetic limbs

  • There is an inability to walk on uneven surfaces leading to discomfort and increased pain

  • There is no transmission of signals from the brain to the nerves due to loss of the limb

  • There is only singular movement accruing to the prosthetic limb

Target Audience:

  • Individuals with an amputated leg

  • Individuals with a fairly active lifestyle (includes high levels of foot activity such as walking and adventuring in unfamiliar territory)

  • Individuals with a desire for less restrictive movement and increased control over their limbs

  • Upper-middle and Upper income groups

Solution (formulated after study from research papers and articles):

Maintain the regular structure of a prosthetic limb in the leg and incorporate the following features

  • Rotatory automated ankle structure to mimic the actual ankle of the human body

  • A sensor at the knee joint to initiate artificial neural signals to navigate through the environment and terrain. This is inspired by the stick insect’s ability to use its antennae to sense objects in front of it and assess the weather in order to navigate through its environment.

  • Retractable spiked padding to increase traction. This is inspired by the stick insects’ use of a combination of hard padding and hairy padding to move with speed and traction across different surfaces.

(A sketch of typical prosthetic limbs available)

(Functional Flow explanation of the BioStride limb)

(Sketches of the BioStride Limb along with possible limitations)