Building on a beetle: Safety, Standards & Compliance

By Purdue University

Being run over by a car is not a near-death experience for a diabolical ironclad beetle. How it survives could inspire the development of materials with the same herculean toughness.

These materials would be stiff but ductile like a paper clip, making machinery, such as aircraft gas turbines, safer and longer-lasting.

A study by engineers at Purdue University and University of California, Irvine, found that the toughness of a diabolical ironclad beetle lies in its two armorlike elytra that meet at a line, or suture, running the length of the abdomen.

In flying beetles, the elytra protect wings and facilitate flight. But a diabolical ironclad beetle doesn’t have wings. Instead, the elytra and connective suture help distribute an applied force more evenly throughout the body.

“The suture kind of acts like a jigsaw puzzle,” said Pablo Zavattieri, Jerry M. and Lynda T. Engelhardt professor of civil engineering at Purdue. “It connects various exoskeletal blades — puzzle pieces — in the abdomen under the elytra.”

He said this jigsaw puzzle comes to the rescue in several different ways depending on the amount of force applied.

A CT scan of the diabolical ironclad beetle shows how its organs are spaced beneath a supertough exoskeleton. Image courtesy of University of California, Irvine