An example of analogy in science writing:
"Then we have the rostellum partially closing the mouth of the nectary, like a trap placed in a run for game; and the trap so complex and perfect, with its symmetrical lines of rupture forming the saddle-shaped disc above, and the lip of the pouch below; and, lastly, this lip so easily depressed that the proboscis of a moth could hardly fail to uncover the viscid disc and adhere to it. But if this did fail to occur, the elastic lip would rise again and re-cover and keep damp the viscid surface. We see the viscid matter within the rostellum attached to the saddle-shaped disc alone, and surrounded by fluid, so that the viscid matter does not set hard till the disc is withdrawn. Then we have the upper surface of the saddle, with its attached caudicles, also kept damp within the bases of the anther-cells, until withdrawn, when the curious clasping movement instantly commences, causing the pollinia to diverge, followed by the movement of depression, which compounded movements together are exactly fitted to cause the ends of the two pollinia to strike the two stigmatic surfaces. These stigmatic surfaces are sticky enough not to tear off the whole pollinium from the proboscis of the moth, but by rupturing the elastic threads to secure a few packets of pollen, leaving plenty for other flowers."
Charles Darwin (writing about Orchis pyramidalis)
Darwin, C. (1862). On the Various Contrivances by which British and Foreign Orchids are Fertilised by Insects, and on the Good Effects of Intercrossing. John Murray.
I consider this is an analogy (going beyond simile) as there is a sense of mapping of structure: the poisition of the the rostellum in relation to the nectary of the flower being positioned as if a trap placed in a run for game.
The reference to the surface of a saddle might be seen as an example of metaphor (it is not actually a saddle), but this is introduced explicitly earlier in the extract as simile: the saddle-shaped disc.
Read examples of scientific analogies
Read about examples of science similes
