Scientists have managed to improve the collection & Transport of water droplets by copying the Namib beetles, Stenocara gracilipes, shell geometry.
The scientists were able to increase the speed of collecting water droplets by 6%. Using the technology of the beetles shell & plants, such as cacti, they were able to create droplets that grew larger & faster as ambient temperatures increased.
This technology will improve the way that we currently harvest water and use it in electricity generation. Creating water droplets may not sound like ground breaking work, but the processes that are involved in the movement and formation of water is vital in the operations of thermal power plants, air conditioning systems and desalination plant.
The design of the beetles shell has tried to be copied before, but the assumption has been that the chemistry of the surface tissue of the beetles wing cases has been the key to water collection, until this discovery that it is the physical arrangements and locations of the dents on the shell that is critical in water collection.