Constructal Law and the Unifying Principle of Design

In this book, experts from biology, physics and the social sciences examine the unification of all design phenomena in nature and apply this knowledge to designs in engineering, such as vascularization for self-healing and self-cooling materials for aircraft.

Design happens everywhere, whether in animate objects (e.g., dendritic lung structures, bacterial colonies, and corals), inanimate patterns (river basins, beach slope, and dendritic crystals), social dynamics (pedestrian traffic flows), or engineered systems (heat dissipation in electronic circuitry). This design in nature often takes on remarkably similar patterns, which can be explained under one unifying Constructal Law. This book explores the unifying power of the Constructal Law and its applications in all domains of design generation and evolution, ranging from biology and geophysics to globalization, energy, sustainability, and security.

The Constructal Law accounts for the universal tendency of flow systems to morph into evolving configurations that provide greater and easier access over time. The Constructal Law resolves the many and contradictory ad hoc statements of optimality, end design, and destiny in nature, such as minimum and maximum entropy production and minimum and maximum flow resistance, and also explains the designs that are observed and copied in biomimetics.

Constructal Law and the Unifying Principle of Design covers the fundamentals of Constructal Theory and Design, as well as presenting a variety of state-of-the-art applications. Experts from the biological, physical and social sciences demonstrate the unification of all design phenomena in nature, and apply this knowledge to novel designs in modern engineering, such as vascularization for self-healing and self-cooling materials for aircraft, and tree fins and cavities for heat transfer enhancement.

Captures a world-wide movement toward design as science Unifies physics and biology, and discusses the place of the Constructal Law in physics and thermodynamics Features an interdisciplinary approach that spans engineering, physics, biology, and the social sciences Demonstrates that a single law governs design of disparate phenomena Includes supplementary material: sn.pub/extras

Inhalt

Preface: Constructal law, design in nature, and complexity.- 1. The Constructal Design of Humanity on the Globe.- 2. Towards a Quantitative Unifying Theory of Natural Design of Flow Systems: Emergence and Evolution.- 3. Leaf Shapes and Venation Patterns.- 4. Drainage Basins Evolution with Non-Erodible Regions.- 5. Software Evolution and the Constructal Law.- 6. Constructal Design of High Conductivity Inserts.- 7. Constructal Design of T-shaped Water Distribution Networks.- 8. The Constructal Theory of Electrokinetic Transport through a Porous System.- 9. Constructal Theory Applied to Vascular Countercurrent Networks.- 10. Constructal Design of Animate and Inanimate Systems: an Answer to Consumerism?.- 11. Constructal Design of Rectangular conjugate Cooling Channels.- 12. The Flow of Stresses: Constructal Design of Perforated Plates Subjected to Tension or Buckling.- 13. Equipartition of Joulean Heat in Thermoelectric Generators.- 14. Constructal Design of Refrigeration Devices.- 15. Constructal Design of Vortex Tubes.- 16. Constructal Design of Wave Energy Converters.- 17. Constructal Design of Thermal Systems.- Index.