The Boxfish Idea

Mercedes-Benz once built a concept car around an unlikely muse: the boxfish, a tropical swimmer shaped almost like a cube. On paper a box should be a disaster in moving fluid, yet this fish darts through reefs with ease. Engineers were just as struck by its skin. The boxfish body is wrapped in interlocking hexagonal plates — a rigid, lightweight natural armor. That honeycomb logic pointed the way to car panels that are both stronger and lighter, solving shape and structure in one design.