STEVENSVILLE (AP) — In the deepest deserts of Namibia, fresh water sweeps across the sands like a ghost.

There are no puddles, nor streams to quench your thirst. Only a fleeting fog that periodically sails across the landscape holds the promise of relief.

When the moist air arrives, the tiny Namibian beetle lifts its wings to the sky.

On the underside, a series of bumps attract and capture the water. The tips of each bump are fashioned from a substance that lures the moisture, while the sides shed it. So water droplets form on the tips and then run down the sides and into the beetle’s mouth.

In the middle of the driest desert, the beetle drinks.

How many thousands of years of evolution did it take for the beetle to learn that trick?

At refugee camps, people have taken a lesson from the Namibian beetle. On the outside of their tents, sheets made of a checkerboard of water-loving and water-hating materials collect water from the air.

It’s not the only place where people are mimicking nature.

Around the world, biologists are working hand in hand with engineers, architects and product designers to explore the natural world in an effort to find sustainable solutions to a wide range of challenges facing humankind.

Janine Benyus, an award-winning natural history writer from Stevensville, is at the forefront of the relatively new movement called biomimicry.

Before Benyus wrote her 1997 book, ‘‘Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature,’’ there wasn’t even a word to describe the work of a few scattered scientists looking for inspiration through nature in different corners of the world.

In the early 1990s, Benyus kept stumbling across their work as she researched material for different books. She started a file of articles and other information she found.

As the folder started to grow, she combined the words ‘‘bios,’’ meaning life, with ‘‘mimesis,’’ meaning to imitate and created the word biomimicry. Over time, the information in the file folder overflowed into a drawer and eventually commanded an entire file cabinet.

‘‘Once I was on the hunt, I started to see it everywhere,’’ Benyus remembered. ‘‘Nobody was using the word biomimicry, but there were scientists out there looking for nature’s advice. There were people talking about the potential of mimicking nature’s strategies and designs to find new and better ways to solve some of the challenges we faced.’’

After all, nature has already spent 3.8 billion years on research and development. Its failures are now fossils. Benyus believes its successes contain strategies the human race can copy in its quest for a sustainable future.

It was an idea whose time had come.

‘‘The timing was right,’’ Benyus said. ‘‘People were getting disenchanted with our own technologies. They were ready to search for different solutions. For many, this was a completely new way of thinking.’’

Nature achieves its purposes without harsh chemicals or excess energy.

Peacock feathers

For instance, the peacock feather in the corner of Benyus’ living room doesn’t depend on pigments to create its brilliant colors. The only pigment the feather contains is melanin, which is brown.

The striking blues and greens and delicate amber and hazel tones are all created by the feather’s structure. Tiny barbs on the feather’s fringed branches are covered with even smaller cylinders of melanin. Connected by the protein keratin, the cylinders form a lattice pattern, which affects the way light passes through and therefore which colors are reflected back to our eyes.

The beauty of color by structural design is that the colors never fade.

Product designers have already latched onto idea. Companies like Nissan have developed structural colors for their products. Some day, you might even be able to walk into your living room and adjust a dial that will change the color of the walls to match your mood.

Gecko’s stickiness

Elsewhere, scientists are developing an incredibly strong tape that mimics the gecko’s ability to stick to walls. They’ve developed self-cleaning paints that copy the structure of a lotus leaf. Others are working on propellers and fans based on spirals found in nature - and which require a fraction of the usual amount of energy to operate.

The possibilities are almost as endless as there are different species of flora and fauna.

‘‘People are seeing nature in a whole new way,’’ Benyus said. ‘‘They’re becoming reconnected.’’

Benyus and Dayna Baumeister started the Biomimicry Guild in Bozeman, which helps spread the word by matching biologists with product designers and engineers, as well as through annual workshops in Montana and Costa Rica. The pair work with a growing number of Fortune 500 companies, like General Mills, Nike, and Procter and Gamble.

‘‘One of the most amazing things about all of this is it is reaching people who almost never step outside or off of concrete,’’ Benyus said. ‘‘For many, it’s really the first time they’ve taken an in-depth look at nature and they’re excited about what they see.’’

These engineers and product designers go home and plant a garden or spend more time outside, she said.

‘‘Before they have this experience, they just would have never even seen a garden or park,’’ she said. ‘‘They would have just walked on by.’’

Recently, Benyus, Baumeister and Bryony Schwan established The Biomimicry Institute in Missoula to promote the new science. Among the institute’s goals are to:

n Educate the general public about the concept of biomimicry and establish biomimicry programs in K-12 schools, colleges, and universities;

n Sponsor a ‘‘Biomimicry Challenge’’ prize that will encourage a biomimicry approach to sustainable innovation; and

n Launch a ‘‘Biomimicry Design Portal,’’ the world’s first digital library of nature’s solutions and online information exchange between biologists and innovators.

On the Net: www.biomimicry.org.