Biomimicry and Sustainable Urban Design

Dear Colleagues,

Humanity faces an unprecedented convergence of ecological and climatic changes that are and will profoundly affect civilisation. At the same time, the growing human population is now mostly urbanised, and urbanisation rates are increasing, particularly in developing nations. Although cities occupy only approximately 3% of the global land area, it is well known that they are large consumers of ecosystem services. Cities are typically sites of tremendous concentrations of energy use, water use, materials, greenhouse gas emissions, and other pollutants. It is clear that the way we build and live in our cities must change rapidly.

How can we create and remediate cities so they become complex self-regulating systems that produce and regenerate ecological and societal health? How can our cities and buildings be designed to evolve over time to become more, rather than less fit for place and purpose? How can cities become responsive ‘living’ entities that can become resilient even as context changes? This Special Issue investigates the potential of biomimicry, of emulating the processes and functions of the living world, from individual organisms through to whole living biomes, as a way to consider some of these questions.

This Special Issue aims to investigate how biomimicry can be applied at urban scales in the design of sustainable, resilient cities through the translation and practical application of biological and ecological knowledge, along with an understanding of human–nature relationships. We invite urban designers, planners, landscape architects, architects, and scientists to reimagine the most common human habitat, i.e., the city, by submitting stimulating, speculative, and forward-thinking original research, case studies, and articles that begin to forge a new way to understand, construct, and live in urban contexts.

Dr. Maibritt Zari
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Biomimetics is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2200 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• Ecomimicry
• Bioinspired design
• Urban design
• Urban ecology
• Ecosystem services
• Landscape architecture
• Ecological design
• Living buildings
• Sustainable urban infrastructure
• Green infrastructure
• Nature-based solutions
• Urban metabolism
• Industrial ecology
• Biophilic design

• Biomimetic Architectural and Urban Design in Biomimetics (4 articles)