Investigating Impact Tolerance of Sea Urchin Shell Structure for Aerospace Applications

Biomimicry takes inspiration from nature to create more resilient and innovative sustainable solutions to complex human problems. The structure of sea urchins can be used as a biological model to create lightweight, impact-resistant material that can be adapted to develop more structurally sound architecture in infrastructure. This report focuses on Echinocyamus pusillus since it primarily relies on its skeletal construction because it lacks collagen fibers within its sutures [1]. Since these bioinspired structures can be used to tolerate harsh environments where impact protection is essential, they can be utilized for many applications like high pressure structures in deep sea exploration and landing gears for space exploration purposes. The purpose of this project is to examine the unique shell structure of the sea urchin through experimental testing and Finite Element Analysis