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	Podcast:		UC Science Today
	Episode:		The many applicatons of bioinspired materials
	Category:		Science & Medicine
	Duration:		00:01:03
	Publish Date:		2016-04-07 00:00:00
	Description:		Bioinspired components are a big part of materials science. Mechanical engineer Suveen Mathaudhu of the University of California, Riverside explains that the concept is to use the principles of a particular organism to design something synthetic that can work in a similar way. "One example that I’ll give is nacre, which is also known as mother of pearl, so you see these in shells and you see them in the ocean. And they have to be able to get bashed around against hard rocks and hard surfaces and when you look at the microstructure, at the fundamental features of nacre, you find platelets of calcium carbonate, hard ceramic shells with glue-like material in the middle that can absorb energy." Using these principles, engineers are able to extract a way of making composites for applications like car bumpers that can survive crashes, or for a soldier’s armor. "And in very similar ways, we can look at other things within nature and design based on the way they’re designed, to meet some modern application."
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