As a species, we’ve done a pretty good job at inventing some useful devices. But as clever as we think we are, given sufficient time, natural selection will beat us at our game at almost every turn.

Velcro, the “zipperless zipper,” exists on a variety of products from children’s shoes to laptop bags to blood pressure gauges to airplane flotation devices. While the term is used synonymously to ...

An interdisciplinary research team at Graz University of Technology (TU Graz) has developed a hook-and-loop fastening system for buildings in the ReCon project together with company partners. This ...

Velcro was originally available only in black, but even when it started coming in multiple colors, 1960s fashionistas wanted nothing to do with it. iStock Technically called “hook-and-loop fastener,” ...

Engineer George de Mestral was walking his dogs in the meadows of the Swiss Alps. When they returned home, he noticed that burr seed pods were stuck on his dogs’ fur! He even found some stuck to his ...

Structure-saving hook-and-loop tech could make it easy to replace walls By Ben Coxworth August 25, 2025 In this particular prototype version of the system, rows of cast-concrete hooks engage rows of ...