Mimêsis - nature at the origins of innovation

This exhibition highlights the animals, plants and minerals that served as models for various innovations.

Nature abounds in inventive solutions, the fruit of four billion years of evolution and selection, whose effectiveness has been proven on a living scale. Numerous examples from botany, zoology and geology have given rise to remarkable biomimetic applications: lotus and hydrophobic coatings; burdock and Velcro; morpho butterfly and Morphotex textile; spider silk and synthetic silk; mussel byssus and glues, etc.

By bringing the natural environment into dialogue with the human innovations it inspires, “Mimêsis” invites the public to rediscover nature from a new angle: that of its intelligence, diversity and inestimable value. It also offers us a lesson in humility, given the complex and often energy-consuming means that humans must mobilise to try and match what nature achieves with elegant economy of means.

Medias

© CC-by_Christian Fischer

Lausanne Tourisme Exhibition