The following is a list of terms and concepts that McDonough Braungart Design Chemistry has developed or that are commonly used to describe the MBDC design paradigm and materials selection protocol.

BIOLOGICAL METABOLISM
The natural processes of ecosystems are a biological metabolism, making safe and healthy use of materials in cycles of abundance.

BIOLOGICAL NUTRIENT
A biodegradable material posing no immediate or eventual hazard to living systems that can be used for human purposes and can safely return to the environment to feed environmental processes.

CRADLE TO CRADLE DESIGN
Cradle to Cradle Design is MBDC's design paradigm, based on principles and an understanding of the pursuit of value, as well as MBDC's processes for product and material research and development, and for educating and training. At a fundamental level, the new paradigm proposes that human design can learn from nature to be effective, safe, enriching, and delightful. Cradle to Cradle Design models human industry on nature's processes, in which materials are viewed as nutrients circulating in healthy, safe metabolisms. Industry must protect and enrich ecosystems—nature's biological metabolism—while also maintaining safe, productive technical metabolism for the high-quality use and circulation of mineral, synthetic, and other materials.

CRADLE TO CRADLE DESIGN PROTOCOL
A scientifically based, peer-reviewed process used to assess and optimize materials used in products and production processes in order to maximize health, safety, effectiveness, and high quality reutilization over many product life cycles.

DESIGN CHEMISTRY
The incorporation of scientific and ecological knowledge into product and process design.

DESIGN FOR DISASSEMBLY
Designing a product to be dismantled for easier maintenance, repair, recovery, and reuse of components and materials.

DOWNCYCLING
The practice of recycling a material in such a way that much of its inherent value is lost (for example, recycling plastic into park benches).

ECO-EFFECTIVENESS
MBDC's strategy for designing human industry that is safe, profitable, and regenerative, producing economic, ecological, and social value.

ECO-EFFICIENCY
The strategy for "sustainability" of minimizing harm to natural systems by reducing the amount of waste and pollution human activities generate.

ECOLOGICAL INTELLIGENCE
A product or process designed to embody the intelligence of natural systems (such as nutrient cycling, interdependence, abundance, diversity, solar power, regeneration).

LIFE CYCLE ASSESSMENT
A technique for assessing the potential environmental impacts of a product by examining all the material and energy inputs and outputs at each life cycle stage.

McDONOUGH BRAUNGART INDEX OF SUSTAINABILITY
MBDC's service and design tool that evaluates a product's materials and processes so that redesign for sustainability can take place. During the process of redesign, the Index can be used to continuously track and monitor progress toward sustainability.

THE NEXT INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION
This emerging movement of production and commerce eliminates the concept of waste, uses energy from renewable sources, and celebrates cultural and biological diversity. The promise of the Next Industrial Revolution is a system of production that fulfills desires for economic and ecological abundance and social equity in both the short and long terms-becoming sustaining (not just sustainable) for all generations.

PRODUCT OF CONSUMPTION
A product designed for safe and complete return to the environment, which becomes nutrients for living systems. The product of consumption design strategy allows products to offer effectiveness without the liability of materials that must be recycled or "managed" after use.

PRODUCT OF SERVICE
A product that is used by the customer, formally or in effect, but owned by the manufacturer. The manufacturer maintains ownership of valuable material assets for continual reuse while the customer receives the service of the product without assuming its material liability. Products that can utilize valuable but potentially hazardous materials can be optimized as Products of Service.

TECHNICAL METABOLISM
Modeled on natural systems, the technical metabolism is MBDC's term for the processes of human industry that maintain and perpetually reuse valuable synthetic and mineral materials in closed loops.

TECHNICAL NUTRIENT
A material that remains in a closed-loop system of manufacture, reuse, and recovery (the technical metabolism), maintaining its value through many product life cycles.

UNMARKETABLES
Materials to be eliminated from human use because they cannot be maintained safely in either biological or technical metabolisms.

WASTE EQUALS FOOD
A principle of natural systems and MBDC that eliminates the concept of waste. In this design strategy, all materials are viewed as continuously valuable, circulating in closed loops of production, use, and recycling.