Human bionic has a long history.
Since ancient times, nature has been the source of various technical ideas, engineering principles and major inventions of human beings. After a long evolution process, a wide variety of biological communities can adapt to the changes in the environment and thus survive and develop. Labor created human beings. With its upright body, hands capable of working, and language for exchanging emotions and thoughts, human beings have promoted the development of the nervous system, especially the brain, in the long-term production practice. Therefore, the unparalleled ability and wisdom of human beings far exceed all groups in the biological world. Through labor, human beings use their intelligence and dexterous hands to make tools, thus gaining greater freedom in nature. The wisdom of human beings not only stays in observing and understanding the biological world, but also imitates biology by using the unique thinking and design ability of human beings, and increases their skills through creative labor. Fish have the ability to come and go freely in the water, so people imitate the shape of fish to build ships and imitate fins with wooden paddles. According to legend, as early as the Dayu period, working people in ancient China observed fish swimming and turning with their tails swinging in the water, and they put wooden paddles on the stern. Through repeated observation, imitation and practice, it was gradually changed to paddle and rudder, which increased the power of the ship and mastered the means of turning the ship. In this way, even in the rolling rivers, people can let ships sail freely.
Birds can spread their wings and fly freely in the air. According to "Han Feizi", Lu Ban used bamboo as a bird to "fly after success, not for three days". However, people prefer to imitate the wings of birds and make themselves fly in the air. As early as more than 400 years ago, Italian Leonardo da Vinci and his assistant carefully dissected birds, studied their body structure and carefully observed their flight. A flapping-wing aircraft was designed and manufactured, which is the first man-made aircraft in the world.
These inventions and attempts to imitate biological structure and function can be considered as pioneers of human bionics and the germination of bionics.
For a long time, creatures have lived in the nature surrounded by sound. They use sound to find food, avoid enemy harm and mate and reproduce. Therefore, sound is an important information for living things. Spalanzanni, an Italian, discovered a long time ago that bats can fly freely in complete darkness, not only avoiding obstacles but also preying on flying insects. However, after blocking their ears, bats are unable to move in the dark. Faced with these facts, Palanzani put forward an unacceptable conclusion: bats can "see" with their ears. After the end of World War I, 1920 Hatai thought that the frequency of sound signals emitted by bats was beyond the hearing range of human ears. It is also pointed out that the bat's method of locating the target is the same as that invented by Lang Zhiwan in World War I by ultrasonic echo. Unfortunately, Hatay's tips have not attracted people's attention, and engineers can't believe that bats have the technology of "echolocation". It was not until 1983 that the electronic measuring instrument was adopted that it was completely confirmed that bats were located by emitting ultrasonic waves. But this is no longer helpful for the early invention of radar and sonar.
Another example is that people study insect behavior too late. 400 years after Leonardo da Vinci studied the flight of birds and built the first flying machine, people finally invented the plane in 1903 after long-term repeated practice, which made the dream of flying into the sky come true. Due to continuous improvement, 30 years later, people's planes surpassed birds in speed, altitude and flight distance, showing human wisdom and talent. However, while continuing to develop faster and higher flying aircraft, designers have encountered another difficult problem, that is, flutter phenomenon in gas dynamics. When the plane flies, the wings vibrate harmfully. The faster the flight, the stronger the flutter of the wings, and even the wings break, causing the plane to fall, and many test pilots are killed. Aircraft designers have spent a lot of energy on eliminating the harmful flutter phenomenon, and it took a long time to find a solution to this problem. A weighting device is placed at the far end of the leading edge of the wing, thus eliminating harmful vibration. However, insects flew in the air as early as 300 million years ago, and they were also harmed by flutter without exception. After long-term evolution, insects have already successfully obtained methods to prevent flutter. When biologists study dragonfly wings, they find that there is a dark keratin thickening area above the leading edge of each wing-wing eye or wing mole. If the wing eye is removed, the flight will become swinging. Experiments have proved that it is the horny tissue of the wing eye that makes the dragonfly's flying wings eliminate the danger of flutter, which is similar to the designer's superb invention. If designers learn the function of wing eye from insects first, and get the design idea that is beneficial to solve flutter, they can avoid long-term exploration and personnel sacrifice. Facing the eyes of dragonfly wings, aircraft designers have a feeling of meeting each other late!
These three examples are thought-provoking and inspire people greatly. Long before humans appeared on the earth, all kinds of creatures had lived in nature for hundreds of millions of years, and gained the ability to adapt to nature in their long-term evolution of struggle for survival. Biological research can show that the extremely accurate and perfect mechanism formed in the process of evolution makes them have the ability to adapt to changes in internal and external environment. There are many fruitful skills in biology. Such as biosynthesis in the body, energy conversion, information reception and transmission, recognition of the outside world, navigation, directional calculation and synthesis, etc., show the incomparable advantages of many machines. The small, sensitive, fast, efficient, reliable and anti-interference of biology is really amazing.
A bridge between biology and technology
Since James Watt (1736 ~1819) invented the steam engine in 1782, people have gained great impetus in the production struggle. In terms of industrial technology, the problems of energy conversion, control and utilization were basically solved, which led to the first industrial revolution, and various machines appeared like mushrooms after rain. The development of industrial technology greatly expanded and enhanced people's physical fitness and freed people from heavy manual labor. With the development of technology, people have experienced the electrical age after the steam engine and moved towards the automation age.
The advent of electronic computers in the 1940s added valuable wealth to the treasure house of human science and technology. It handled tens of thousands of kinds of information in people's hands with reliable and efficient skills, freeing people from the sea of figures and information in Wang Yang. Using computers and automatic devices can make people easy and labor-saving in the face of complicated production procedures. They accurately adjust and control production procedures and make product specifications accurate. However, the automatic control device works according to the fixed program formulated by people, which makes its control ability have great limitations. The automatic device lacks the ability to analyze and react flexibly to the outside world. If any unexpected situation occurs, the automatic device will stop working or even have an accident, which is the serious shortcoming of the automatic device itself. To overcome this shortcoming, it is nothing more than "communication" between various parts of the machine and between the machine and the environment, that is, the automatic control device has the ability to adapt to changes in the internal and external environment. To solve this problem, how to accept and transform is necessary in engineering technology. The problem of using and controlling information. Therefore, the use and control of information has become a major contradiction in the development of industrial technology. How to solve this contradiction? The biological world has provided beneficial enlightenment to mankind.
In order to get enlightenment from biological systems, human beings need to first study whether there are * * * identical characteristics between biological and technical devices. 1940, the regulation theory, compares organisms with machines in a general sense. By 1944, some scientists have made it clear that a series of problems such as communication between machines and organisms, automatic control and statistical mechanics are consistent. On the basis of this understanding, 1947, a new discipline-cybernetics came into being.
Cybernetics comes from Greek, and its original meaning is "steering". According to one of the founders of cybernetics, Norbef Wiener (1894 ~1964), cybernetics is defined as "science about control and communication in animals and machines". Although this definition is too simple and only a subtitle of Wiener's classic works on cybernetics, it directly links people's understanding of biology and machines.
The basic viewpoint of cybernetics holds that there are certain * * * bodies between animals (especially people) and machines (including all kinds of automatic devices for communication, control and calculation), that is, there are certain * * * same laws in their control systems. According to the research of cybernetics, the control process of various control systems includes information transmission, transformation and processing. The normal operation of the control system depends on the normal process of information transportation. The so-called control system means that the controlled object and various control elements, components and circuits are organically combined into a whole with certain control functions. From the information point of view, the control system is a network or system of information channels. There are many similarities between machines and control systems in organisms, so people have great interest in biological automatic systems, and further research on biological systems is carried out by using physical, mathematical and even technical models. Therefore, control theory has become the theoretical basis of connecting biology and engineering technology. Become a bridge between biological system and technical system.
There are obvious similarities between organisms and machines, which can be manifested in different levels of research on organisms. From simple single cell to complex organ system (such as nervous system), there are various physiological processes of regulation and automatic control. We can regard organism as a machine with special ability, which is different from other machines in that it also has the ability to adapt to the external environment and reproduce itself. You can also compare an organism to an automated factory, and all its functions follow the laws of mechanics; Its various structures work in harmony; They can respond quantitatively to certain signals and stimuli, and they can adjust themselves in a self-controlled way by means of special feedback contact organizations like automatic control. For example, the constant body temperature, normal blood pressure and normal blood sugar concentration in our body are all the results of adjustment by the complex self-control system in the body. The emergence and development of cybernetics has bridged the connection between biological system and technical system, and made many engineers consciously seek new design ideas and principles from biological system. So there is a trend that engineers take the initiative to learn biological science knowledge in order to get results in the field of engineering technology with biologists.
The birth of bionics
With the needs of production and the development of science and technology, people have realized that biological system is one of the main ways to open up new technologies since the 1950s, and consciously regard the biological world as the source of various technical ideas, design principles and inventions. People use chemistry, physics, mathematics and technical models to carry out in-depth research on biological systems, which has promoted the great development of biology and made rapid progress in the study of functional mechanisms in organisms. At this time, the simulated creature is no longer a fascinating fantasy, but a fact that can be done. Biologists and engineers actively cooperated and began to use the knowledge gained from biology to improve old or create new engineering equipment. Biology began to step into the ranks of technological innovation and revolution in all walks of life, and first of all, it achieved success in military departments such as automatic control, aviation and navigation. Therefore, biology and engineering technology disciplines are combined and infiltrated with each other to give birth to a new science-bionics.
As an independent discipline, bionics was formally born in September 1960. The first bionics conference was held at Dayton Air Force Base, Ohio by the US Air Force Aviation Administration. The central topic discussed at the meeting was "Can the concepts obtained from the analysis of biological systems be applied to the design of artificial information processing systems?" Steele named "Bionics" as a new science, and its Greek meaning stands for the science of studying the function of life system. 1963 China translated "Bionics" into "bionics". Steele defined bionics as "the science of imitating biological principles to build technical systems, or making artificial technical systems have or resemble biological characteristics". In short, bionics is the science of imitating biology. To be exact, bionics is a comprehensive science that studies various excellent characteristics of biological systems, such as structure, characteristics, functions, energy conversion, information control, etc., and applies them to technical systems, improves existing technical engineering equipment, and creates new technical systems such as technological processes, architectural configurations, and automation devices. From the biological point of view, bionics belongs to a branch of "applied biology"; From the perspective of engineering technology, bionics provides new principles, new methods and new ways for designing and building new technical equipment based on the study of biological systems. The glorious mission of bionics is to provide mankind with the most reliable, flexible, efficient and economical technical system close to biological system for the benefit of mankind.
Research methods and contents of bionics
Bionics is a new frontier science which combines biology, mathematics and engineering technology. The first bionics conference set an interesting and vivid symbol for bionics: a huge integral symbol, which "integrated" the scalpel and the electric soldering iron together. The meaning of this symbol not only shows the composition of bionics, but also summarizes the research approach of bionics.
The task of bionics is to study the excellent ability and principles of biological system, model it, and then apply these principles to design and manufacture new technical equipment.
The main research method of bionics is to propose a model and simulate it. The research procedure is roughly divided into the following three stages:
The first is the study of biological prototype. According to the specific topics put forward by the production practice, the biological data obtained from the research are simplified, the contents beneficial to the technical requirements are absorbed, and the factors unrelated to the production technical requirements are eliminated to obtain a biological model; The second stage is to analyze the data provided by the biological model mathematically, abstract its internal relations, and "translate" the biological model into a mathematical model with certain significance in mathematical language; Finally, the mathematical model makes a physical model that can be tested in engineering technology. Of course, in the process of biological simulation, it is not only simple bionic, but more importantly, there is innovation in bionic. After repeated practice-understanding-practice, the simulated things can meet the needs of production more and more. As a result of this simulation, the final mechanical equipment will be different from the biological prototype, and in some ways it will exceed the ability of the biological prototype. For example, today's airplanes exceed the flying ability of birds in many aspects, and electronic computers are faster and more reliable than human computing ability in complex calculations.
The basic research methods of bionics make it show a prominent feature in biological research, that is, integrity. From the perspective of bionics as a whole, it regards biology as a complex system that can contact and control the internal and external environment. Its task is to study the interrelation between the parts in a complex system and the behavior and state of the whole system. The basic characteristics of living things are self-renewal and self-replication, which are inseparable from the outside world. Living things can grow and reproduce only when they get material and energy from the environment; Living things can adapt and evolve only by receiving information from the environment and constantly adjusting and synthesizing it. Long-term evolution has enabled organisms to achieve the unity of structure and function, and the coordination and unity of part and whole. Bionics should study the quantitative relationship between objects and external stimuli (input information), that is, focus on the unity of quantitative relationship before simulation can be carried out. In order to achieve this goal, any partial method can not achieve satisfactory results. Therefore, the research method of bionics must focus on the whole.
The research content of bionics is extremely colorful, because the biological world itself contains thousands of kinds, which have various excellent structures and functions for various industries to study. In the twenty years since the advent of bionics, the research of bionics has developed rapidly and achieved great results. Its research scope can include electronic bionic, mechanical bionic, architectural bionic, chemical bionic and so on. With the development of modern engineering technology, there are many branches of disciplines, and corresponding technical bionic research is carried out in bionics. For example, the study of hydrodynamics of aquatic animal movement by the navigation department; The aviation department simulates the flight of birds and insects, locates and navigates animals; Simulation of biomechanics by engineering buildings; Simulation of human nerve cells, sensory palace and neural network by radio technology department; The simulation of computer technology to the brain and the research of artificial intelligence. Typical topics presented at the first bionics conference include: what are the characteristics of artificial neurons, problems in designing biological computers, recognizing images with machines, and learning machines. It can be seen that the research on electronic bionics is extensive. The research topics of bionics mostly focus on the following three kinds of biological prototypes, that is, the overall function of animal sensory organs, neurons and nervous system. In the future, the research on mechanical bionics and chemical bionics has also been carried out. In recent years, new branches have emerged, such as human bionics, molecular bionics and cosmic bionics.
In a word, the research content of bionics includes a wider range of contents, from molecular bionics to macro-cosmic bionics. Today's science and technology are in a new era in which various natural sciences are highly integrated, intersected and infiltrated. Bionics combines the research and practice of life through simulation, and at the same time it has greatly promoted the development of biology. Under the infiltration and influence of other disciplines, the research methods of biological science have undergone a fundamental change; The content also deepens from the level of description and analysis to the direction of accuracy and quantification. The development of biological science takes bionics as a channel to convey valuable information and rich nutrition to various natural and technical sciences, and accelerate the development of science. In this way, the research of bionics shows infinite vitality, and its development and achievements will make great contributions to promoting the development of science and technology in the world as a whole.
The research scope of bionics
The research scope of bionics mainly includes: mechanical bionics, molecular bionics, energy bionics, information and control bionics and so on.
Mechanical bionic is to study and imitate the static properties of the general structure and fine structure of organisms, as well as the relative motion of various components of organisms in the body and the dynamic properties of the movement of organisms in the environment. For example, a long-span thin-shell building built by imitating shells and a column built by imitating the femoral structure can not only eliminate the area where stress is particularly concentrated, but also bear the maximum load with the least building materials. Imitating the groove structure of dolphin skin militarily, applying artificial dolphin leather bag on the hull of the ship can reduce the navigation flow and improve the speed;
Molecular bionics is to study and simulate the catalysis of enzymes, the selectivity and permeability of biofilm, the analysis and synthesis of biomacromolecules or their analogues in organisms. For example, after understanding the chemical structure of the sex pheromone of the forest pest gypsy moth, a similar organic compound was synthesized, which can be used to trap and kill male insects in a field insect trap with one millionth of a microgram;
Energy bionics is to study and imitate the energy conversion process in organisms such as bioluminescence of bioelectrical organs and direct conversion of chemical energy into mechanical energy by muscles;
◇ Bionics of information and control is to study and simulate the information processing process in organisms such as sensory organs, neurons and neural networks, and intelligent activities of advanced centers. For example, an "autocorrelation velocimeter" based on the optokinetic response of weevil can measure the landing speed of aircraft. According to the working principle of the lateral inhibition network of limulus compound eye, some devices which can enhance the image contour and improve the contrast are successfully developed, thus contributing to the detection of blurred objects. More than 100 kinds of neuron models have been established, and a new computer has been constructed on this basis.
Imitating the human learning process, a machine called "perceptron" is made, which can learn by training and changing the weight of the connection between components, thus realizing pattern recognition. In addition, it also studies and simulates the control mechanisms in biological systems such as homeostasis, motion control, animal orientation and navigation, and the bionics of man-machine system.
In some literatures, the part of molecular bionics and energy bionics is called chemical bionics, while the part of information and control bionics is called neurobionics.
The scope of bionics is very wide, and information and control bionics is a main field. On the one hand, because of the development of automation to intelligent control, on the other hand, because biological science has developed to such a stage, studying the brain has become the biggest challenge to neuroscience. The bionics aspects of artificial intelligence and intelligent robot research-the research of biological pattern recognition, the research and simulation of brain learning, memory and thinking process, the reliability and coordination of control in organisms, etc.-are the main aspects of bionics research.
Control is closely related to information bionics and biological cybernetics. Both of them study the control and information process in biological systems, and both use the model of biological systems. But the purpose of the former is mainly to construct practical artificial hardware system; Biocybernetics, on the other hand, seeks an explanation for biological behavior from the general principles of cybernetics and the theory of technical science.
The most extensive use of analogy, simulation and model methods is a prominent feature of bionics research methods. Its purpose is not to directly copy every detail, but to understand the working principle of biological systems and to achieve specific functions as the central purpose. It is generally believed that there are three related aspects in bionics research: biological prototype, mathematical model and hardware model. The former is the foundation and the latter is the purpose, and the mathematical model is an essential bridge between them.
Because of the complexity of biological system, it takes a long research period to find out the mechanism of a biological system, and it takes a long time to cooperate closely with many disciplines to solve practical problems, which is the main reason that limits the development speed of bionics.
The phenomenon of bionics
Flies and Spaceships
Annoying flies seem to have nothing to do with the grand space cause, but bionics closely links them.
Flies are notorious "stinkers", and they are found everywhere that smells foul. Flies have a particularly sensitive sense of smell, and they can smell smells thousands of meters away. But the fly does not have a "nose". What does it rely on to act as a sense of smell? It turns out that the "nose" of flies-olfactory receptors are distributed on a pair of antennae on the head.
Each "nose" has only one "nostril" communicating with the outside world, which contains hundreds of olfactory nerve cells. If odor enters the nostrils, these nerves immediately convert the odor stimulus into nerve electrical impulses and send them to the brain. The brain can distinguish substances with different smells according to the different nerve electrical impulses generated by substances with different smells. Therefore, the fly's antenna is like a sensitive gas analyzer.
Inspired by this, bionics successfully imitated a very strange small gas analyzer according to the structure and function of fly olfactory organ. The probe of this instrument is not a metal, but a live fly. A very fine microelectrode is inserted into the olfactory nerve of a fly, and the guided neuroelectric signal is amplified by an electronic circuit and sent to an analyzer; The analyzer can give an alarm as soon as it finds the signal of the odorous substance. This instrument has been installed in the cockpit of the spacecraft to detect the composition of the gas in the cabin.
This small gas analyzer can also measure harmful gases in submarines and mines. This principle can also be used to improve the input device of computer and the structural principle of gas chromatography analyzer.
From fireflies to artificial luminescence
Since man invented the electric light, life has become much more convenient and rich. But electric lamps can only convert a small part of electric energy into visible light, and most of the rest are wasted in the form of heat energy, and the heat rays of electric lamps are harmful to people's eyes. So, is there a light source that only emits light without heating? Humans have turned their attention to nature again.
In nature, many creatures can emit light, such as bacteria, fungi, worms, mollusks, crustaceans, insects and fish, and the light emitted by these animals does not produce heat, so it is also called "cold light".
Among many luminous animals, fireflies are one of them. There are about 1 500 species of fireflies, and their luminescent colors are yellow-green, orange, and their brightness is also different. Fireflies emit cold light, which not only has high luminous efficiency, but also is generally soft and suitable for human eyes, and the intensity of light is relatively high. Therefore, bioluminescence is an ideal light for human beings.
Scientists have found that the luminous device of fireflies is located in the abdomen. This light emitter consists of three parts: a light emitting layer, a transparent layer and a reflecting layer. The luminescent layer has thousands of luminescent cells, all of which contain fluorescein and luciferase. Under the action of luciferase, fluorescein, with the participation of intracellular water, combines with oxidation to emit fluorescence. The luminescence of fireflies is essentially a process of converting chemical energy into light energy.
As early as 1940s, people created fluorescent lamps based on the study of fireflies, which greatly changed the lighting sources of human beings. In recent years, scientists first isolated pure fluorescein from fireflies, then isolated luciferase, and then synthesized fluorescein artificially by chemical methods. A biological light source composed of fluorescein, luciferase, ATP (adenosine triphosphate) and water can be used as a flash lamp in a mine full of explosive gas. Because this kind of light has no power supply and will not produce magnetic field, it can be used to clear magnetic mines under the illumination of biological light source.
Now, people can get cold light similar to biological light by mixing some chemicals for safe lighting.
Electric Fish and Volt Battery
Many creatures in nature can generate electricity, and there are more than 500 species of fish alone. People refer to these fish that can discharge electricity as "electric fish".
All kinds of electric fish have different discharge skills. The electric ray, electric catfish and electric eel have the strongest discharge ability. Medium-sized torpedoes can generate about 70 volts, while African torpedoes can generate as much as 220 volts; African electric catfish can generate 350 volts; Electric eels can generate 500 volts. There is a South American electric eel that can generate as high as 880 volts, which is called the champion of electric shock. It is said that it can kill big animals like horses.
Where is the mystery of electric fish discharge? After the anatomical study of the electric fish, it is finally found that there is a strange power generation organ in the electric fish. These generators are made up of many translucent disk-shaped cells called electric plates or disks. Because of the different types of electric fish, the shape, position and number of electric plates of the generator are different. The generator of electric eel is prismatic and located in the muscles on both sides of the tail spine; The generator of torpedo is shaped like a flat kidney, which is arranged on both sides of the midline of the body, and there are 2 million electric plates. The generator of electric catfish originated from some kind of gland, located between skin and muscle, with about 5 million electric plates. The voltage generated by a single plate is very weak, but because there are many plates, the voltage generated is very large.
The extraordinary skill of electric fish has aroused great interest. /kloc-At the beginning of the 9th century, the Italian physicist Volt designed the world's earliest voltaic cell based on the electric fish power generation organ. Because this kind of battery is designed according to the natural generator of electric fish, it is called "artificial electrical officer" The study of electric fish also gives people such enlightenment: if the power generation organ of electric fish can be successfully imitated, then the power problems of ships and submarines can be well solved.
The windward ears of jellyfish
"Swallows fly low to rain, cicadas sing and the sky clears up in the rain." The behavior of living things has something to do with the change of weather. Fishermen along the coast know that the fish and jellyfish living along the coast swim to the sea in batches, which indicates that the storm is coming.
Jellyfish, also called jellyfish, is an ancient coelenterate, which floated in the ocean as early as 500 million years ago. This kind of inferior animal has the instinct to predict storms, and every time before storm warning, it swims to the sea to take refuge.
It turns out that in the blue ocean, infrasound (frequency is 8-13 times per second) generated by the friction between air and waves is always the prelude of storm warning. This infrasound can't be heard by human ears, but the little jellyfish is very sensitive. Biomimetics found that there is a thin handle in the cavity of the jellyfish's ear, and there is a small ball on the handle, and there is a small auditory stone in the ball. When the infrasound before the storm hits the auditory stone in the jellyfish's ear, the auditory stone stimulates the nerve receptors on the ball wall, so the jellyfish hears the rumble of the coming storm.
Biomimetics imitated the structure and function of jellyfish ears, and designed a storm predictor for jellyfish ears, which accurately simulated the organs of jellyfish that felt infrasound. When this instrument is installed on the front deck of a ship, when it receives the infrasound wave of the storm, it can make the horn rotating 360 stop rotating automatically, and the direction it refers to is the direction of the storm. The reading on the indicator can tell the strength of the storm. This predictor can forecast the storm 15 hours in advance, which is of great significance to the safety of navigation and fishery.