Nature is a master designer, and recent years have seen more scientists and engineers drawing inspiration from the world around them when developing materials and technologies (Figure 1). In the November 2025 special issue of Journal of the American Ceramic Society, the promises and challenges of emulating nature are demonstrated through 30 research and review articles with the theme “Materials Design with Learning from Nature.”

In the feature article “Nature-inspired hierarchical materials,”¹ the issue’s lead editors frame the underlying discussion. Nature excels at using constrained production conditions (e.g., everyday temperature and pressure ranges) to convert limited types of building-block materials (e.g., proteins, minerals, and carbohydrates) into components with intricate structures that exhibit exceptional performance in areas such as toughness.