Talk:Bionics

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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 16 May 2019 and 24 August 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): NearFutureTECH. Peer reviewers: NearFutureTECH.

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Citations

Several points in this article are stated as fact; there are no references sited to support them, however. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mincyneburga (talk • contribs) 17:33, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

The article states, "The word bionic was coined by Jack E. Steele in 1958...", yet an advertisement in PHOTO-ERA magazine, dated May, 1917, for the ANSCO Vest Pocket No. 0 camera shows it's Bionic shutter. ANSCO had already been using a shutter called the Bionic Shutter for several years in several models of their cameras. Also, from a 1922 Ansco catalog 71.189.67.11 (talk) 16:18, 12 May 2014 (UTC)

What are researchers who work with Bionics called? Bionicians? Bioneers? 217.76.87.120 (talk) 19:42, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Possible Citogenesis

I searched Google for any other material that used the term "bionical creativity engineering" and the only source I could find (Twenty-First Century's Fuel Sufficiency Roadmap) was published in 2012 - after the phrase was added to the article)

References

Bionics vs. Prosthesis suggestion to remove bias from the definition

Looking at the "Specific uses of the term" section under the "In medicine" sub-section, I read the following definition for Bionics:

"In medicine, bionics means the replacement or enhancement of organs or other body parts by mechanical versions. Bionic implants differ from mere prostheses by mimicking the original function very closely, or even surpassing it.'

My worry here is that using the word "mere" prosthesis is somewhat bias toward bionics on the difference between the to. It suggests that prosthesis is a old field and bionics will replace it and that prosthesis does not involve the enhancements of body parts. This could not be further from the truth. Objectively speaking we see examples of the continued research in prosthesis alongside bionics in Neuroprosthetics and especially toward enhancement of other body parts in Powered exoskeleton. Both these example challenge this definition of bionics. My opinion though is that we simply remove the word "mere" from the above definition, so that the definition does not offend those in the field of modern prosthesis research. However I would like to get a second opinion before I edit anything. Does anyone disagree? Does anyone agree? 128.61.112.90 (talk) 21:37, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Bionics vs Biomimetics by Gerald Loeb

Dr Gerald Loeb, at the University of Southern California said that some information on this page was incorrect. He sent me this document which is more accurate. I am not an expert in this field, so will leave someone else to incorporate his information into the article.

Bionic and Biomimetic – History and Definition

By Gerald E. Loeb, M.D., Professor of Biomedical Engineering, University of Southern California, gloeb@usc.edu

(Background: I am the inventor of the BION (registered trademark) injectable neuromuscular stimulator, one of the inventors of the cochlear implant, one of the first researchers in prosthetic vision starting in 1969, former Chief Scientist for Advanced Bionics Corp., the first of several companies to use “bionic” in their names, a founder and former Deputy Director of the National Science Foundation Engineering Research Center for Biomimetic MicroElectronic Systems, currently CEO of SynTouch LLC developers of biomimetic tactile sensors for prosthetic and robotic hands, and currently on the board of advisors for Victhom Human Bionics Inc. and the journal Applied Bionics and Biomechanics. The following is an attempt to correct many misuses and misconceptions that seem to have found their way into the Wikipedia entries for these topics, perhaps starting with the equally ill-informed Encyclopaedia Britannica entries.)

The Wiki biography of Dr. Jack Steele notes his coinage of the term “bionic” in 1958 to denote what is now known as “biomimetic” – the study of biological organisms to find solutions to engineering problems. The term “bionics” was essentially reinvented in 1974 by the TV series The Six Million Dollar Man and subsequently The Bionic Woman, to mean the fusion of biological and electronic components to achieve function, i.e. BIOlogical + electroNIC. The word was assiduously avoided for over 20 years by almost all academic researchers and prosthetics manufacturers because of its overly optimistic association with superhuman powers. It started to appear in serious use after the formation of Advanced Bionics Corp. circa 1990, a leading manufacturer of cochlear implants, perhaps the most advanced and clinically successful “bionic” technology to date. Prochazka et al. in the 1990s developed a “Bionic Glove”, a neuromuscular stimulation system to assist grasp. Gerald Loeb adapted the term to “BION” as a registered trademark for a line of injectable, single-channel neuromuscular stimulators that represent an elemental interface, evoking the allusion to “ions” (first published use 1999; http://bme.usc.edu/assets/002/49189.pdf). Other relatively recent commercial uses of the term consistent with restoration of human motor function include Touch Bionics (www.touchbionics.com), Bionic Technology by Ossur (http://bionics.ossur.com/), Martin Bionics (www.martinbionics.com), and Victhom Human Bionics (www.victhom.com). There is a journal of Applied Bionics and Biomechanics and a Chinese Journal of Bionic Engineering (although its articles tend more toward the original usage for biologically inspired mechanical devices). The term “cyborg” refers to a bionic entity with an advanced computational function (i.e. cybernetic), but there are lots of users of simpler bionic technology who would not consider themselves to be “cyborgs.” There are also many recent misappropriations of the word “bionic” for completely unrelated products just to make them sound techie (music, auto parts, food, cosmetics, software, etc.).

The term “biomimetic” has a less dubious heritage than “bionic”. It is originally attributed to Otto Schmitt in the 1950s. It has been widely and appropriately used for any biologically inspired engineering design, whether in chemistry, nanotechnology, adhesives, mechanical structures, locomotion, sense organs or computing.

Malrase (talk) 18:23, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

The Six Million Dollar Man is a derivative of Martin Caidin's novel Cyborg. Caidin indeed uses the term "bionics", and -- to the point -- explicitly credits then-Major Jack Steele for the coinage. 66.170.243.1 (talk) 16:03, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

References

Arthropods or anthropoids?

The example section refers to "anthropods". I presume this is a typo, meant to refer to either arthropods or anhropoids? I'm guessing the first one... right? --Aukikco (talk) 03:56, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

Not all technology that resembles or shares nomenclature with life is biomimetic

A point of fact. Technology is not necessarily inspired by life simply because it comprises, for want of a better term, an artificial homologous structure. In nature, homologous structures are solutions that arise to similar problems, through processes not causally chained to one another. People are not always intentionally emulating life forms. Is there a citation backing up the idea that flexible boat hulls are inspired by dolphin skin, or is somebody just saying that? Radar is hardly bat sonar. It was a synthesis following scientific understanding of electromagnetic properties assisted by advancements in wave theory associated with development of sonar and other technology. Was the design of sonar technology ever actually informed by bats, or is that story apocryphal? Did some guy hear that bats use sound to find things, and then decide to try and do the same thing using whatever technique came to mind, or was sonar technology initiated by an attempt to study the specific way bats hear sound? were there different approaches over time to refine solutions; were some (any) of them genuinely informed by bats?

Sections ascribing life-imitating inspiration are a bit of a stretch, and should be reworded and perhaps backed up with citations that establish specific historical connections between each example used and the life said to inspire it. Another direction people take too far is to conflate things given life-like labels with the life processes themselves. Neural computing is a term often applied to a few specific algorithms, in such a way that verges on asserting that those are processing in the way that a natural brain does, when in fact it is an elegant but simple mathematical process that is in no way an accurate approximation of any real system of neurons. It has the potential for miscommunication, at least. Was there intent by early experimenters to use so-called "neural net computing" to understand real neural activity, and if so in what ways has it served that purpose? mention this. Kodrin (talk) 06:48, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Examples

Perhaps the thermoelectric heat storage of the silk cocoons of hornets should be mentioned ? These give off heat if the temperature drops below a specific level. KVDP (talk) 14:58, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Merge with Biomimicry?

The Biomimicry article mentions bionics in the lede as an alternate term. Likewise, this article mentions biomimetics. Should these two pages be merged? If not, shouldn't they be removed from each other's ledes (or at least properly linked)? —TedPavlic (talk/contrib/@) 06:33, 27 November 2012 (UTC)

• Whatever the sources reveal – start with references. What do the best references out there support? If these are the same field, then this needs to be backed up by verifiable sources. See WP:VER. If the experts out there consider these two fields one and the same, then document this including citations, and merge the two articles. On the other hand, if the experts consider these distinct fields, then document what distinguishes them apart from each other, including citations. If there is controversy over whether or not they are the same field, with no clear consensus out there, then the two fields must be covered separately, pointing out both sides of the controversy, with citations. A good place to look is academia - are they treated as separate academic fields (with their own university departments, supporting journals, etc.)? I look forward to seeing what you find that the sources support. Please do not merge these articles until sufficient verification has been provided in the form of citations. Thank you. The Transhumanist 20:50, 28 August 2013 (UTC)

Issue with biomimetic synthesis redirecting here, and request for assitance in stub creation. [LeProf]

I would ask assistance in creating a stub that I can then develop with the help of interested parties into a full article. The synthetic organic term "biomimetic synthesis" redirects to this current bionics article. This is unhelpful, pedagogically—a sentence or more in a regular article on "biomimetic synthesis" making reference to its relationship to the broader area of bionics is certainly appropriate. But for this important contemporary and historical subject in chemical synthesis to be nested in the bionics article, solely, is off-point of the articles wishing to offer a wikipedia definition and perspective on biomimetic syntheses (and is otherwise confusing).

If someone with wikipedia editorial experience could create a stub for this new article (a skill I lack), then I can begin to expand it as a subject matter expert.

Here is a beginning of the stub:

"

Biomimtic synthesis is an area of organic chemical synthesis that is specifically biologically inspired, so-named in 1917 by English organic and natural products chemist, early practitioner, and Nobel laureate Sir Robert Robinson. The area of research can include the testing of a "biogenetic hypothesis" (conjectured course of biosynthesis in nature) through execution of a series of reactions designed to parallel the proposed biosynthetic origin, or to a synthetic reaction or reactions toward a desired synthetic goal that are designed to mimic a known, single enzymic transformation, or a more complete biosynthetic pathway. The earliest generally cited example of a biomimetic sythesis is Robinson's organic synthesis of tropinone;

a further classic pedagogic example is E.J. Corey's carbenium-mediated cyclization of an engineered linear polyene to provide a tetracyclic steroid ring system, which built upon studies of cationic cyclizations of linear polyenes by the Albert Eschenmoser and Gilbert Stork groups, and the extensive studies of the W.S. Johnson group to define the requirements to initiate and terminate the cyclization, and to stablize the cationic carbenium group during the cyclization (as nature accomplishes via enzymes during biosynthesis of steroids such as cholesterol).

"

Here, then, are a couple further citations that can be used in a reading list:

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Biomimetic-Synthesis/192320090788112 http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/book/10.1002/9783527634606 http://stoltz.caltech.edu/seminars/2004_Ashley.pdf

Thank you. LeProf — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.179.92.36 (talk) 06:50, 24 November 2013 (UTC)

References

Medicine

Shouldn't medicine be mentioned as well ? See also http://www.worldtoxinbank.com/ , http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/02/venom/holland-text KVDP (talk) 12:18, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

External links modified

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Hello fellow editors!

I fixed Professor Julian Vincent's broken external link to verify his area of expertise. Let me know what you think.

Thank you!

NearFutureTECH (talk) 15:22, 23 May 2019 (UTC)

Revisiting a merge

@The Transhumanist: Tripping over an old topic :) It seems to me the sources in this and the biomimetics article use the two terms interchangeably; and that the merge challenge has gotten worse rather than better in the intervening years (as more text in the article bodies was added to address the confusion). I started a merge discussion on the other page. – SJ + 03:11, 19 April 2021 (UTC)