Monolayer of polymer latex spheres was prepared at the air/water interface and deposited onto glass slides through Langmuir;Blodgett (LB) technique. Large-scale, high quality hexagonally close-packed domains were found in scanning elec-tron microscopic pictures. Details of the monolayer-forming ability were discussed. Suitable surface characteristics of the col-loidal particles, especially the hydrophilic and hydrophobic properties, are the keys for the formation of ordered monolayer films. The film can be transferred onto various kinds of substrates, even high curvature surface articles, such as fibers, decorations etc, can also be used as substrates. The advantages of this fabrication method of polymer latex spheres monolayer are fast, flexible, simple and very neat.

A number of investigations into application of polymers for macro-morphological modification of tool surface have been carried out. These researches, with extensive stress on convex or domed protuberations as one of the widely used construction units, have tried to harness benefits from using polymers in agriculture. Ultra high molecular weight polyethylene (UHMW-PE) has proved an emerging polymer in its application to reduce soil adhesion. This research was conducted to study the effect of shape (flat, semi-spherical, semi-oblate, semi short-prolate and semi long-prolate) and dimensions (base diameter and dome height) on sliding resistance and normal adhesion of biomimetic plates. To incorporate both shape and size, a dimensionless ratio of height to diameter (HDR) was introduced to characterize the effect of construction unit’s physique. Experiments were con-ducted in Bangkok clay soil with dry (19.8% d.b.), sticky (36.9% d.b.) and flooded (60.1% d.b.) soil conditions respectively. Soil at sticky limit exhibited the highest sliding resistance (77.8 N) and normal adhesion (3 kPa to 7 kPa), whereas these values were 61.7 N and <0.2 kPa in dry, and 53.7 N and 0.5 kPa to 1.5 kPa in flooded soil conditions. Protuberances with HDR ≤ 0.5 lowered sliding resistance by 10% – 30% and the same reduced normal adhesion by 10% – 60%. The amount of reduction in both sliding resistance and normal adhesion was higher in flooded soil. Lighter normal loads obviously produced lesser resistance and ad-hesion.

This paper presents an application of an Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) algorithm to optimize the parameters in the design of a type of nonlinear PID controller. The ACO algorithm is a novel heuristic bionic algorithm, which is based on the behaviour of real ants in nature searching for food. In order to optimize the parameters of the nonlinear PID controller using ACO algorithm, an objective function based on position tracing error was constructed, and elitist strategy was adopted in the improved ACO algorithm. Detailed simulation steps are presented. This nonlinear PID controller using the ACO algorithm has high precision of control and quick response.

The normal displacement of articular cartilage was measured under load and in sliding, and the coefficient of friction during sliding was measured using a UMT-2 Multi-Specimen Test System. The maximum normal displacement under load and the start-up frictional coefficient have similar tendency of variation with loading time. The sliding speed does not significantly influence the frictional coefficient of articular cartilage.

The effect of microscale contact of rough surfaces on the adhesion and friction under negative normal forces was experimentally investigated. The adhesive force of single point contact &#8722; sapphire ball to flat polyurethane did not vary with the normal force. With rough surface contact, which was assumed to be a great number of point contacts, the adhesive force increased logarithmically with the normal force. Under negative normal force adhesive state, the tangential force (more than hundred mN) were much larger than the negative normal force (several mN) and increased with the linear decrease of negative normal force. The results reveal why the gecko’s toe must slide slightly on the target surface when it makes contact on a surface and suggest how a biomimetic gecko foot might be designed.

An improved artificial immune algorithm with a dynamic threshold is presented. The calculation for the affinity function in the real-valued coding artificial immune algorithm is modified through considering the antibody’s fitness and setting the dynamic threshold value. Numerical experiments show that compared with the genetic algorithm and the originally real-valued coding artificial immune algorithm, the improved algorithm possesses high speed of convergence and good performance for preventing premature convergence.

Ideas from engineering have helped the understanding of biological organisms for thousands of years. However, the mechanical aspects of biological materials and structures can, if properly interpreted and analysed, lead to a deeper understanding of the biology of organisms. Such an approach, although always current in some form, is nevertheless subject to the vagaries of fashion and the availability of analytical techniques. At present we are in a period of upturn. Areas of interest are deployable structures (applications in aerospace), palaeontology (how little do we need to know in order to create a credible biosphere) and food science (we need a rational approach to the mechanics of food).