The world is poorly designed. But copying nature helps.

In 1989, Japan’s Shinkansen Bullet Train had a problem.

It was fast — really fast — like, pushing 170 miles per hour fast.

But every time it exited a tunnel — it was loud.

The noise was coming from a variety of sources, but whenever a train

sped into a tunnel, it pushed waves of atmospheric pressure through the other end.

The air exited tunnels with a sonic boom that could be heard 400 meters away.

In dense residential areas, that was a huge problem.

So, an engineering team was brought in to design a quieter, faster, and more efficient

train.

And they had one secret weapon: Eiji Nakatsu — the general manager of the technical development

department — was a birdwatcher.

Different components of the redesigned bullet train were based on different birds.

Owls inspired the pantograph — that’s the rig that connects the train to the electric

wires above.

Nakatsu modeled the redesign after their feathers, reducing noise by using the same serrations

and curvature that allow them to silently swoop down to catch prey.

The Adelie Penguin — whose smooth body allows it to swim and slide effortlessly — inspired

the pantograph’s supporting shaft, redesigned for lower wind resistance.

And perhaps most notable of all was the Kingfisher.

The Kingfisher is a bird that dives into water to catch its prey.

The unique shape of its beak allows it to do that while barely making a splash.

Nakatsu took that shape to the design table.

The team shot bullets shaped like different train nose models down a pipe to measure pressure

waves, and dropped them in water to measure the splash size.

The quietest nose design was the one modeled most closely after the Kingfisher’s beak.

When the redesign debuted in 1997, it was 10% faster, used 15% less electricity,

and stayed under the 70 dB noise limit in residential areas.

And it did all that with the wings of an owl, the belly of a penguin, and the nose of a

Kingfisher.

There’s a name for design like this.

It’s called biomimicry.

The people who design our world usually never take a biology class, believe it or not.

So they're novices in how the world works.

That’s Janine Benyus.

Back in 1997, she wrote the book that coined the term “Biomimicry”.

It told the story of the innovations in computing, energy, and health that were inspired by structures

in the natural world.

Stick like a gecko.

Compute like a cell.