SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST

In a game show format, six animals pitch natural qualities or features that have inspired human technological innovations.

Shark Tank has nothing on this wild creature smackdown. The panel of judges is literally a tank of sharks, and the six contestants range from a peacock mantis shrimp with a super-fast punch and a shy gecko with nanohairs on its feet that can grip nearly any surface to a confident humpback whale sporting hydrodynamic bumps, or tubercles, on its fins. “Sponsored” by the growers of Leafy Green Solar Curtains (“The only curtains that store sunlight as energy…while they block your neighbors from seeing you play video games in your underwear!”), the contest ultimately awards one lucky winner a Best in Engineering Design. But Donnelly goes on to explain why, for instance, the whale’s lumpy tubercles inspired more aerodynamic fan blades and how the gecko’s toes have led to advances in spacecraft and to devices that allow humans to stick to glass walls. Along with leaving plenty of space for the variously timid or aggressive pitches and lucid anatomical descriptions, Saburi’s tidily drawn cartoon panels give both the banter and the presentations a properly rapid flow that adds to the fun and suspense. “Nature,” as the hermit crab host observes at the outset, “was the first inventor—so let’s see what we can learn!”

An epic clash, well worth the investment.