How Termites inspired a building that can cool itself?

The building is made from concrete slabs and bricks. Just like the soil inside the termite mound, these materials have high “thermal mass” — which means they can absorb a lot of heat without really changing temperature. The exterior of the building is prickly like a cactus.

What innovative building design was inspired by termites?

BIOMIMETIC ARCHITECTURE: Green Building in Zimbabwe Modeled After Termite Mounds.

What inspired self cooling buildings?

In the 1990s, Mick Pearce, the building’s architect, took his inspiration from mounds built by fungus-farming termites he saw on a nature show. The insects created their own air conditioning systems that circulated hot and cool air between the mound and the outside.

Why did Engineers in Zimbabwe model new buildings based on termite mounds?

The Eastgate Centre is a shopping center and office building located in Harare, Zimbabwe. At the time of the building’s design, researchers had proposed that termite mounds maintained stable internal climates by having a physical structure that enables passive internal airflow.

What is biomimicry in design?

Biomimicry, as it’s called, is a method for creating solutions to human challenges by emulating designs and ideas found in nature. It’s used everywhere: buildings, vehicles, and even materials — so we thought it’d be fun to round up a few of the most noteworthy examples.

How did termites help us to ventilate a building?

These intricate structures preserve a steady level of atmosphere, humidity and temperature in the termite nests beneath them while enabling the exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide between the inside and outside of the mound. Gas exchange in buildings is hitched to bulk air flow between the inside and outside.

How do termites develop?

“Termites build mounds by joining bricks just like we do to build houses,” Zachariah explained. The ‘bricks’ to the bugs are tiny rolled-up balls of soil. Many bricks joined together are called boluses.

How did termites help to ventilate a building?

How do African termites keep their mounds cool?

Six feet below ground level is the cellar. It’s the coolest part of the structure. Its ceiling is comprised of a series of thin plates that absorb moisture from the colony above and provide another ingenious cooling mechanism. As the moisture evaporates, the temperature falls, cooling the air around the nest.

How has technology been influenced by nature?

Through evolution by natural selection, Nature has been able to work out creative solutions to support all forms of life on earth. By observing and studying these life forms – their behavior, movement, form, adaptability, and so on, humans have developed new technologies or optimized existing ones.

What objects are inspired by nature?

Following are some of the discoveries and innovations that human beings have made thanks to nature, in one way or the other.

• Flight.
• Submarine.
• Velcro.
• Bullet train.
• Sonar.
• Flipper.
• Architecture.
• Cat eye.

What is the temperature inside a termite mound?

“The Eastgate building [a famous example of a “termite-inspired” design] is modeled on the self-cooling mounds … that maintain the temperature inside their nest to within one degree of 31 °C, day and night … “ –“Indeed, termites must live in a constant temperature of exactly 87 degrees (F) to survive.”

What can biomimicry teach us about air-conditioning?

Instead of using large inputs of energy and toxic chemicals to make things and ship them across the globe, nature makes what it needs where it needs it, with water-based chemistry. These designs suggest some of what could be learned by applying the lessons of biomimicry to the problem of air-conditioning in particular.

How do termite mounds maintain the temperature of the nest?

A schematic showing the natural ventilation used in the Eastgate building in Harare. It was previously thought that termite mounds functioned to continuously maintain the nest’s internal temperature within a narrow range in the face of extreme outside temperature fluctuations.

How do insects cool a building?

The insects accomplish that feat with a clever system of air pockets, which drive natural ventilation through convection. Architect Mick Pearce and engineering firm Arup borrowed that idea to build Eastgate Centre, a large office and shopping center in Zimbabwe that is cooled with the outside air.

How do termite mounds stay cool in Africa?

A few years ago, scientists observed that big termite mounds in Africa stay remarkably cool inside, even in blistering heat. The insects accomplish that feat with a clever system of air pockets, which drive natural ventilation through convection.