Now, a hi-tech transition system with tree canopies

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Tree canopies appear to provide crucial insights into ways to design complex systems to deliver liquid healing agents from one object to another through a network similar to ‘blood vessels of human skin,’ say researchers.

Duke University engineers believe that an image of two tree branches touching top-to-top can guide their efforts to most efficiently control the flow of liquids in new materials.

The new delivery system will also be useful in the next generation of aircraft and rocket “skins” that can self-repair when damaged or self-cool when overheated, they said in a study appeared online in the Journal of Applied Physics.

“Examples of this branching design tendency are everywhere in nature, from the channels making up river deltas to the architecture of the human lung, where cascading pathways of air tubes deliver oxygen to tissues,” said Adrian Bejan, J A Jones professor of mechanical engineering at Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering.

Developing the most efficient and effective manner of controlling flow is becoming increasingly important, as engineers strive to create the next generation of nanodevices and ‘smart’ materials.

The goal of this research is to create materials that act like human skin by delivering liquid healing agents through a network much like blood vessels. Materials such as these will need efficient delivery systems, Bejan said. PTI

Working with Sylvie Lorente, professor of civil engineering at the University of Toulouse, France, Bejan found that the laws of constructal theory which he first described in 1996, could guide the creation of these novel ‘smart’ materials.