Biomimicry

"In recent years, the desire to emulate botanical processes for environmental benefit has inspired "design similes," such as cities that behave like forests, buildings that act as trees, or products that operate like plants. Although such comparisons serve to promote ideal goals, they are difficult to put into actual practice. Irvine, Calif.-based Newlight Technologies has found a way to achieve the latter objective, with a plastic that is made by mimicking the material production method of plants. AirCarbon is a type of polyester that is made from air rather than oil. Like plants, Newlight's "GHG-to-Plastic" process captures CO2 from the air, and isolates the carbon and oxygen elements. The company then polymerizes C and O and reassembles them into a long-chain thermopolymer. The resulting plastic is biodegradable, recyclable in multiple stages, and has programmable compostability."

"Trees naturally filter and clean our air, but in today’s heavily polluted world, it’s just too huge of a task to expect Mother Nature to take care of herself. Taking this into account, designers Mario Caceres and Cristian Canonico have designed a set of beautiful air-filtering trees for the SHIFTboston urban intervention contest. Called TREEPODS, the designs harnesses biomimicry to efficiently emulate the carbon filtration qualities of trees."