When classifying the astonishing inventions of nature that
are imitated in bionics, a distinction is made between analogies
in processes or products, and abstractions. Examples of analogies
include airplanes, spiroid winglets, new car tire profiles that
are modeled on cats’ paws, and spiderlike robots with autonomous
legs. Examples of abstractions include the lotus effect for
self-cleaning surfaces, building elements that are modeled like
trees or bones, riblet foils to reduce friction (in imitation of sharkskin),
and Velcro (in imitation of burrs). Other examples of abstractions
include swarm intelligence and ant algorithms, which
create ant-like autonomous system behaviors (sometimes with
ant-like robots, as showcased recently at the 2016 Hanover Fair).