The Gift from Nature: Bio-Inspired Strategy for Developing Innovative Bridges

Biology has been a brilliant teacher and a precious textbook to man-made construction for thousands of years, because it allows one to learn and be inspired by nature's remarkable and efficient structural systems. However, the emerging biomimetic studies have been of increasing interest for civil engineering design only in the past two decades. Bridge design is one of aspects on structural engineering of biomimetics that offers an enormous potential for inspiration in various aspects, such as the geometry, structure, mechanism, energy use and the intelligence. Recently built bridges and design proposals in which biological systems have produced a range of inspiration are reviewed in this paper. Multidisciplinary cooperation is discussed for the implementation of bio-inspired methods in future design. A case study about using bio-inspired strategy is trying to present a problem-solving approach, yet further cooperation is still needed to utilize biomimetic studies for design inspiration. This paper aims to call a close multidisciplinary collaboration that promotes engineers to build more sustainable and smart structural systems for bridges in the 21st century.