Are the ideal model for a lot of solar technology, so it only makes sense of manmade solar panels would look to Mother Nature to improve the efficiency of their designs due to degradation caused by Over time, solar cells wear down- just like ultraviolet light. A team of researchers revealed this week that they have created a new type of solar cell that can repair and reinvigorate itself by mimicking the functioning of organic 2. In 1996, Dieter Gurtler and his colleagues from the Mercedes Technology Center in Germany, were looking for a model for a holistically conceived bionic car, respecting at once physics, design and aerodynamics. The team's first instincts were to use streamlined sharks, penguins, dolphins, and tunas. But on a visit to the Rosenstein Museum in Stuttgart, with its huge collection of preserved fish, it became clear that their "ideas of tunas and sharks were not useful to design cars, which contain a cubicle for passengers, while swiftly-swimming fishes are compressed" It was their idea to choose a slowly but steadily swimming fish, and the was the first option. 3. The "architecture" of itself. creates a natural air-conditioning system that runs all by are amazing little critters. They are tiny, even by insect standards, yet they build towers as high as 7 meters to house colonies that can consist of several million animals. But living in a fortress without windows has its downsides too. One challenge for the is getting enough fresh air into the intricate system of tunnels they inhabit. There have been various theories on how fresh air gets into the but a news study published in this month Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences has recorded what actually happens inside the and revealed that the solely to their ingenious design. ventilate themselves thanks 4. A bullet train emerging from a tunnel generates thunderclap due to the air pressure which builds up in front of the nose. In the 1990s a Japanese engineer Eiji Nakatsu noticed that could dive into the water with barely a splash. His design for the Shinkansen bullet train, based on the beak, not only reduced the noise of the train but was also more aerodynamic, using less power and enabling higher speeds. 5. The brilliant colour of some comes from an assembly of tiny plates in a specific pattern that reflects light of a certain wave length. Researchers are looking to develop similar colour displays for e-readers; they would work by reflecting light, not transmitting it from behind the screen, like LCD screens do. 6 The effects of static electricity were first recorded by a Greek philosopher Thales of Miletus ['berliz ov mar'li tos] who lived between 624 and 546 BC. He is said to have experimented with which the Greeks referred to as elektron and cat fur to create an electrical discharge as well as magnetism.