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The challenge is the same in many industries, particularly in aerospace and automotive: the future of these sectors largely depends on their ability to reduce the environmental impact of their technologies, especially CO2 emissions.
A key lever: improving aerodynamic efficiency. Aerostructures, bodywork, lifting surfaces, propellers, and blades: biomimicry is an ideal technological design tool for reviewing or improving industrial methods and approaches to aerodynamics.
Many species of birds, insects, and aquatic animals possess amazing locomotion abilities.
They juggle effort, speed, and endurance. Biomimicry, which is no stranger to this field, seeks to understand how these forms and coatings found in nature can inform the adoption of new design approaches for industrial structures and components. The goal: to reduce drag, improve aerodynamic efficiency, mitigate turbulent vortices, stabilize movement, reduce friction, and so on.
The aeronautics industry is one of the most advanced in terms of bio-inspiration: winglets inspired by large birds of prey (-4% fuel consumption), aerodynamic varnishes inspired by shark skin (-2% fuel consumption). The use cases are already numerous.
There are still many opportunities to explore. Here is a particularly striking example.
The humpback whale: the necessary search for stealth
The humpback whale is a cetacean of impressive size: 13 to 15 meters long and weighing nearly 40 tons.
Despite this, it is a particularly agile marine animal , capable of hunting herring or salmon: it is able to turn sharply to trap or chase its prey.
This duality of size and agility surprises marine biologists. They discover that part of the mystery lies in the anatomical characteristics of the humpback whale.
Indeed, its agility is due to the tubercles on the leading edges of its fins. A peculiarity that defies common sense : how can such an irregular and uneven surface be so hydro- and aerodynamic?
Since then, the aerodynamic effects of these protrusions have been extensively studied: the tubercles reduce drag by nearly 8%. They also follow the airflow in such a way as to delay stall and increase its angle by nearly 40%! Other advantages, although not yet proven, have been suggested: reduction of noise and increased lift.
©Bioxegy | Diagram on the right partly based on the figures in: True & William, The Whalebone Whales of the Western North Atlantic, 1904
Diagrams created by the Bioxegy team, as part of an infrastructure project conducted with one of our partners. The fin tubercles, located upstream of the phalanges on the leading edge, help, among other things, to stabilize and group disruptive vortices.
©Bioxegy | Diagram on the right partly based on the figures in: True & William, The Whalebone Whales of the Western North Atlantic, 1904
This discovery has since led to numerous bio-inspired technologies:
ZIPP, an expert manufacturer of bicycle wheels, opted for a design reproducing the protrusions of the fin to improve the aerodynamics and stability of the entire structure: a patented technology that has significantly reduced the drag experienced by the wheel.
In Canada, one of the experts who highlighted the aerodynamic phenomena created by the tubers launched the company WhalePower.
This company designed a bio-inspired wind turbine blade that incorporates a protrusion on the leading edge to improve the efficiency of the lifting surface. As a result, the turbine equipped with this technology has a 20% higher efficiency and operates in lower wind speeds.
Discover other technical areas of interest in biomimicry
Aerodynamics & Hydrodynamics
Biomimicry & aerodynamics: a no-brainer
