Last week I found myself in Zürich, Switzerland, which in itself is somewhat unusual for a person who typically lives and works in the great state of Texas.  To add to that, while installed in said location I experienced one of those intensive periods of excitement and discovery that only happen when you toss yourself and an over-stuffed rolling suitcase headlong into a foreign country and participate in a workshop in order to learn how to screen print electroluminescent lamps (and also to learn that, although they are healthier, multigrain croissants are simply not as delicious as the regular kind).

I should preface this by explaining, as I did many times to curious collaborators over the course of a week skipping up and down five flights of art school stairs coated in phosphor ink, exactly how I came to be in Switzerland in the first place.  The travel process was pretty standard, actually: I took a car to the airport, and then flew to another airport, and then another one, and then rode an extremely quiet and efficient train into Zürich, which turned out to be an extremely quiet and efficient city.

But in all seriousness, I’d like to extend sincere thanks to Manuel Kretzer, CAAD – Chair of Computer Aided Architectural Design, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Karmen Franinovic, Interaction Design, DDE, Zurich University of the Arts, Daniel Bisig, Institute for Computer Music and Sound Technology, DMU, Zurich University of the Arts, and Rachel Wingfield and Mathias Gmachl of Loop.pH, along with my amazing fellow workshop collaborators, all of whom I consider excellent, encouraging, and genius-tastic new friends, for the opportunity to participate in the Actuated Matter Workshop because … the experience was completely epic.

So epic, in fact, that I am in the process of producing a series of posts that focus on each of the materials/technologies that we investigated (I will turn the list into a series of links once everything is written because only today am I over my debilitating jet lag/have finished doing all my laundry):

Glass-fiber Reinforced Plastic

Electroluminescent (EL) Lamps

Electro-active Polymer (EAP)

Printed Loudspeakers

Thermochromic Ink

Although I have written about some of these items in the past, I must confess to you all that a hands-on approach where you try to make these materials do something specific has given me a new insight – and I almost feel like each has a distinct personality (and some may even have distinct personality disorders).

Another thing I noticed was that there is a peculiar rush associated with actuating matter – when Manuel casually electrocuted our EL lamps into functionality, I felt like Dr. Frankenstein watching the monster open his eyes for the first time and it flooded me with a curious mixture of fascination and relief (not to mention a bit of suprise that the modules actually worked after the number of failed trial attempts).

EL Modules from ARCHITERIALS on Vimeo.

And, lucky for us, the EL lamps did not turn around and run out the door to kill innocent villagers like Frankenstein’s monster.  Well, at least, not as far as I know….

VergeLabs, an architecture and design practice based in the United Arab Emirates founded as a partnership between Ginger Krieg Dosier and Michael Dosier, brought some of that magic to concrete with their development of Glowcrete.

Image courtesy Vergelabs

The researchers used phosphorescent pigment in two ways to produce glowing concrete: they added the pigment to expansion cement, the pigment, when distributed unevenly, left a glowing trail that served as a record of the mixing process; and they also added the phosphorescent pigment to the concrete as aggregate. The even distribution of pigment in the second case creates a uniform distribution of light emission.

In each case, as the surface of the concrete weathers and erodes, new phosphorescent aggregate is exposed, which extends the lifespan of the luminescence (Source: Vergelabs).  I’d like to learn more about the phosphorescent pigment the researchers used – I’m not sure how long it lasts or whether it’s toxic (although I’d imagine the answers to those questions are: not very and yes).  That being acknowledged, I can so clearly imagine this material at the bottom of a swimming pool or fountain, or even on the underside of an unfinished concrete slab – pure magic.

WU XING:

I have filed glowcrete under Earth (concrete) and Fire (glowiness!)

Cited:

Dosier, Ginger Kreig and Michael. “Glowcrete.” Vergelabs Research in Architecture. 05/30/06. Accessed 06/03/11. URL.

Scientists have been working with carbon nanotubes (essentially, rolled up sheets of graphene) to encourage solar cells to convert more of the sun’s energy to electricity.  Theoretically, nanotubes “gather more electrons that are kicked up from the surface of a PV cell, allowing a greater number of electrons to produce a current” (Boyle).  More electrons means more power, so it’s a decent line of research to pursue.

image courtesy roselawgroup.com

In practice, however, using carbon nanotubes in solar cells has proved more complicated than one might like for two reasons: “first, the making of carbon nanotubes generally produces a mix of two types, some of which act as semiconductors (sometimes allowing an electric current to flow, sometimes not) or metals (which act like wires, allowing current to flow easily). The new research, for the first time, showed that the effects of these two types tend to be different, because the semiconducting nanotubes can enhance the performance of solar cells, but the metallic ones have the opposite effect. Second, nanotubes tend to clump together, which reduces their effectiveness” (Chandler). Understanding the differences between the two types of nanotubes could be useful for designing more efficient nanoscale batteries, piezoelectrics or other power-related materials.

Image credit Matt Klug, Biomolecular Materials Group

Graduate students Xiangnan Dang and Hyunjung Yi, MIT professor Angela Belcher and colleagues turned to biology for a solution to these nanochallenges, employing a genetically engineered version of a virus called M13, prone to attacking and infecting bacteria.  M13 can arrange and order nanotubes on a surface.  The virus has peptides that bind to the nanotubes, allowing them to separate the tubes so they can’t short out the circuits, and it also prevents clumping. “Each virus can grip about five to 10 nanotubes each, using roughly 300 of the protein molecules. The viruses were also genetically engineered to produce a layer of titanium dioxide, which happens to be the key ingredient in Grätzel cells, a.k.a. dye-sensitized solar cells… This close contact between TiO2 nanoparticles helps transport the electrons more efficiently” (Boyle).

Interestingly, the viruses also make the nanotubes water-soluble, which could lower manufacturing costs by facilitating the incorporation of nanotubes into solar cells at room temperature.  The virus-built structures enhanced the solar cells’ power conversion efficiency to 10.6 percent from 8 percent. That’s about a one-third improvement, using a viral system that makes up just 0.1 percent of the cells’ weight (Boyle). A little help from biology goes a long way.

WU XING:

I have filed this under fire, because the main idea relates to energy.

Cited:

Boyle, Rebecca. “MIT Researchers use Viruses to Build More Efficient Solar Panels.” Popsci.com 04/25/11. Accessed 04/26/11. URL.

Chandler, David L. “Solar Power Goes Viral.” MIT News Office. 04/25/11. Accessed 04/26/11. URL.

Image by © Roger Ressmeyer/CORBIS

In Northern California, the brief periods between earthquakes are made lively by a counterpoint of alternating floods and wildfires. The floods lead to mudslides, and there isn’t much any material on the facade can do to prevent an entire building being carried down the hillside by the hill itself. The wildfires, however, delight in ingniting wood cladding, and it is in the fireproofing arena that a brick facade has the leg up. So what would you choose? A flexible material that resists damage in the event of an earthquake or a rigid material that cracks under shear stress but that stands up to fire?

The answer, of course, is yes – meaning that you’d choose a material that is both flexible AND fireproof. Reider, a family-owned Austrian concrete manufacturing company, is making just such a material at this very moment in its factories, which you have to imagine must be surrounded by edelweiss and roving melodious von Trap children.

Image courtesy Stylepark

FibreC is a fiberglass-reinforced concrete panel that can be used for outside facades as well as indoors. It’s a “thin-walled material with a pleasant feel and natural look” that is resilient and at the same time flexible, rendering it suitable for a wide range of practical applications (Stylepark). FibreC has been available in large panels for quite some time, and now it’s also being manufactured in the shape of thin slats. This new shape means that FibreC is a fireproof alternative to wooden panel cladding! Reider touts it as a sustainable material because it’s made of sand, cement, and glass fibers, and the manufacturing process is reportedly eco-friendly.  FibreC comes in a wide range of colors and a few different finishes:

Image courtesy Stylepark

FibreC was used by Architects Alan Dempsey and Alvin Huang, who won a competition to design a temporary, freestanding pavilion that was built in front of the Architectural Association school in London.  The high tensile strength of FibreC allowed the development of a “simple interlocking cross joint which is tightened by slightly bending each element as it is locked into consecutive cross elements. Consultation with the Fibre-C technical department in Austria has suggested that a flex of 15-20mm per metre can be applied without affecting the structural performance of the material. The appearance of small micro cracks on the surface is mitigated by using lighter material colours and a Ferro finish” (Dezeen).

Image Courtesy Loz Pycock

The pavilion was fabricated from curved profiles nested on standard 13mm flat sheets and cut with a water jet.  I think the effect is rather splendid, and it’s certainly not a fire hazard. Thanks to David Conover of StudioConover for sending me info on FibreC!

WU XING:

I filed FibreC under earth (because of its composition) and fire (because it’s fireproof).

Cited:

“Slab Format Thin Concrete.” Stylepark.com. 01/10/10. Accessed 02/07/11. URL.

“C Space Pavilion by Alan Dempsey and Alvin Huang.” Dezeen.com 11/04/07. Accessed 02/09/11. URL.

Yesterday I learned that researchers at MIT have developed functional plastic fibers that can detect and produce sound.  As you can imagine, my coffee cup almost instantly hit the carpet.  After I wiped up the spill, I dug a little deeper to find out what this singing fiber business is all about. 

It seems that the new acoustic fibers are composed of a conducting plastic commonly used in microphones that contains graphite, the same material found in pencil lead and in my leg, from the time when I accidentally stabbed myself with a pencil in my sleep.  (Have I mentioned that I can be a little bit accident-prone?) To make fibers, long strands are drawn from a heated “preform,” (a large cylinder of a single material) and are then cooled. 

The fibers “derive their functionality from the elaborate geometrical arrangement of several different materials, which must survive the heating and drawing process intact.  By playing with the plastic’s fluorine content, the researchers were able to ensure that its molecules remain lopsided — with fluorine atoms lined up on one side and hydrogen atoms on the other — even during heating and drawing.  The asymmetry of the molecules is what makes the plastic “piezoelectric,” meaning that it changes shape when an electric field is applied to it” (Hardesty).  In other words, the composition of the plastic allows it to retain its useful properties throughout the process of forming it into thin strands.

Because the conducting plastic used by the researchers maintains a higher viscosity (stays thick) when heated, it allows the scientists to draw out fibers with uniform thickness.  They then apply an electrical field that is – get this – 20 times as powerful as the fields that cause lightning during storms – to the plastic in order to align all the piezoelectric molecules in the same direction.  If the fibers aren’t uniform, the electric field would generate a tiny lightning bolt!!

Photo: Research Laboratory of Electronics at MIT/Greg Hren Photograph

Despite the inherent challenges of the manufacturing process (incidental lightning and so on) the researchers built fibers that you can actually hear when you connect them to a power supply and cause them to vibrate.  As the frequency changes, the fibers emit different sounds (Hardesty).  The fibers are incredibly sensitive to vibration, which means they are capable of responding to changes in their surrounding environment.

The potential applications of these acoustic fibers include wearable microphones and biological sensors, loose nets that monitor the flow of water in the ocean and large-area sonar imaging systems with high resolutions.  Fabric woven from acoustic fibers would provide the equivalent of millions of tiny acoustic sensors, which could be used to create clothes that act as sensitive microphones for capturing speech or monitoring bodily functions.  Tiny fiber filaments could measure blood flow in capillaries or pressure in the brain (Hardesty).  These fibers are fantastic, and (AHEM) I’d love to get my hands on some!

More information:“Multimaterial piezoelectric fibres.” S. Egusa, Z. Wang, N. Chocat, Z. M. Ruff, A. M. Stolyarov, D. Shemuly, F. Sorin, P. T. Rakich, J. D. Joannopoulos, and Y. Fink. Nature Materials, 11 July 2010.

Provided by Massachusetts Institute of Technology (news : web).

WU XING:

I’m categorizing these fibers under WOOD because they’re plastic, and FIRE because of the heat and electric field required to make them.

Cited:

Hardesty, Larry. “Fibers that can hear and sing.” Physorg.com. 07/12/10.  Accessed 07/13/10.  URL.

“The wheel in the sky keeps on turnin’ / I don’t know where I’ll be tomorrow”

Well, okay, I mostly know where I’ll be tomorrow (at the office) but there are a few hours between work and going to sleep tomorrow night that I’m going to play by ear.

Image credit www.moonbeammcqueen.wordpress.com

So now onward to our highly anticipated wheel discussion.  I’m going to assume that the readership of this blog are all pretty fond of wheels due to the fact that wheels make moving things around much easier.  You can use our round and spinning friends to shift people, animals, vegetables, and even minerals.  One thing you might not be using a wheel to move right now is air – but as it turns out, you could be. 

Image credit Airxchange

Airxchange out of Rockland, Mass. has developed an Energy Recovery Wheel designed to supply and humidify/dehumidify fresh air to buildings without simultaneously leaking out all of the inside air that has already been heated or cooled.  “Airxchange energy recovery wheels rotate between the incoming outdoor airstream and the building exhaust airstream. As the wheel rotates, it transfers a percentage of the heat and moisture differential from one airstream to the other. Consequently, the outdoor air is ‘pre-conditioned’ significantly reducing the capacity and energy needed from the mechanical HVAC system.” (Source: Airxchange). 

Images courtesy www.Airxchange.com

LEED and other Green Building protocols award points for increasing natural ventilation in buildings and reducing the energy consumption of HVAC systems.  Airxchange claims that conditioning outdoor air can represent 40% of an HVAC system’s capacity, and that the pre-conditioning ventilation provided by an Energy Recovery Wheel will reduce the load on the system by 70%.  It seems like preconditioning the air with the wheels could make a significant difference.  Does anyone have any experience with the wheels? Hit up the comments!

Airxchange wheels are available in a wide range of sizes for a variety of mechanical systems and come with a five-year warranty. The silica gel desiccant that removes humidity from the air is permanently bonded to the energy transfer media for durability; and cleaning or replacement takes about 15 minutes.  I found a nifty article that explains what’s involved with Energy Recovery Wheel Maintenance.   

WU XING:

I have categorized this under water and fire because it involves dehumidification and air conditioning/temperature changes.

Cited:

“Energy Recovery Wheels.”  Product Roundup.  GreenSource Magazine.  o6/30/10.  Accessed 07/01/10.  URL.

Image credit www.devicedaily.com

Here’s how solar cells work at the most basic level:  photons (units of light) hit the surface of the cells and the light energy is quickly absorbed by the semiconductor material.  The incoming energy knocks electrons loose from the silicon, and when that happens it’s as close to spring break in Fort Lauderdale as it gets at the atomic level.  To keep all the electrons from spending the night sobering up in the local jail and having to make teary calls home their parents, two metal contacts (one at the top and one at the bottom of each cell) create an electric field that forces all the crazy sunburned drunken electrons to line up and form a current that allows us to put them to good use (Source: HowStuffWorks). 

It’s not as easy as you might think to free electrons from their cozy little orbits, and today’s best solar cells are not as efficient as one might hope: they convert only “15 to 20 percent of the energy in sunlight into electricity” (Bourzac).  We’ve been using way too much silicon to generate not enough electricity for much too much money for far too long.  But that could change because a new photovoltaic material has been developed that performs just as well as current solar cells yet uses only one percent of the material to do it!

Image credit M. Kelzenberg

Researchers at Caltech led by professor of applied physics and materials science Harry Atwater have developed a “flexible array of light-absorbing silicon microwires and light-reflecting metal nanoparticles embedded in a polymer” (Bourzac).  The idea is that the new material traps incoming photons of light and keeps them bouncing around dislodging electrons for longer periods of time – generating more electricity from less material.  Highly reflective alumina nanoparticles are mixed with a rubbery polymer, forming a coating which is applied to arrays of anti-reflective silicon microwires “grown” from gas on the surface of a reusable template.  “Once the polymer sets, the entire thing can be peeled off like a sticker. Over 90 percent of the resulting material is composed of the cheap polymer, and the template can be used again and again … The material can absorb 85 percent of the sunlight that hits it, and 95 percent of the photons in this light will generate an electron” (Bourzac).

Image Credit M. Kelzenberg

Using less silicon and decreasing the complexity of the manufacturing process could mean that it will take less capital to build solar cell components and that we will be able to build them more quickly. 

WU XING:

This is a fire material because of the light-trapping.

Cited:

Bourzac, Katherine. “Material Traps Light on the Cheap.” Technology Review 02/26/10.  Accessed 03/01/10.  URL.

After eight long years of research and development and the expenditure of almost 400 million dollars, Bloom Energy has begun the intensive process of hyping their (relatively) low-cost fuel cell technology: Bloom boxes.  The boxes have been installed at Google, eBay, Wal-Mart and other companies looking for some greenie points, and Bloom Energy hopes they’ll be able to generate (ha!) enough of a frenzy to position their boxes as a viable alternative to connecting to the electrical grid. 

Fuel cells generate electricity by a chemical reaction, and the electrical current can then be directed outside the cell to do work (run a motor, create an invisible fence, etc).  To understand more about the basics of fuel cells check out this comprehensive site that the Smithsonian put together.  Fuel cells are great because they’re efficient and they decentralize power generation – but the problem to date has been that they are really really really ridiculously expensive.

The idea behind Bloom boxes is that if, in the near future, you desire a mini power plant for personal or business use, you’ll be able to afford to install one or two “in your back yard … next to the dumpster at your corporate campus, or at your local electric-car charging station” (Keegan).  Units run on natural gas and/or bio-fuel to generate electricity.  Each box is about the size of a water heater, but the core of the assembly is a 6″ x 6″ cube containing some number of thin ceramic wafers separated from each other by a cheap metal alloy. 

 Image courtesy OnlyGizmos.com

The thin ceramic wafers are coated with a special black ink on one side and green ink on the other.  As natural gas and oxygen are simultaneously pumped to either side of the wafers, the gas fuel is electrochemically oxidized.  This reaction causes water and electrons to be released through the anode. The electrons follow an external circuit to be used as energy (Ricker).  According to the company, Bloom boxes don’t vibrate, emit sound, or produce odor. 

K. R. Sridhar, CEO of Bloom Energy and an India-born PhD, came up with the idea for the Bloom Box after “developing a device for NASA that would be able to create oxygen on Mars.  After NASA ditched their Mars mission, Sridhar had the idea to reverse the oxygen-creating Mars box and use oxygen as the input instead. Voila the Bloom Box” (Fehrenbacher).  You can watch a “60 minutes” interview with Sridhar here:

WU XING:

Bloom boxes rely on ceramics, produce water as a waste product, and generate electricity.  That’s why I placed ’em in earth, water, and fire respectively.

Cited:

Fehrenbacher, Katie. “10 Things to know about Bloom Energy.” Earth2Tech 02/21/10.  Accessed 02/22/10.  URL.

Keegan, Paul. “Is K.R. Sidhar’s Magic Box Ready for Prime Time?” Fortune 02/09/10.  Accessed 02/22/10.  URL.

Ricker, Thomas. “A Power Plant for the Home.” Engadget.  02/22/10.  Accessed 02/23/10.  URL.

Image courtesy mddailyrecord.com

Bunting used a 3D printer to fabricate some of the plastic components for the hexapod, which allowed him to incorporate more complicated geometries into his design.  Thin layers of plastic are layered on top of each other by the printer to build up the required pieces.  In addition to shapely plastic legs, the hexapod has an Intel Atom processor for a brain and a Logitech webcam for eyes, which it uses to teach itself to walk each time it is activated.  As the robot experiments with movement, the webcam takes pictures from each position.  The hexapod is programmed to compare specific features in the various images in order to understand how it is moving itself.  Motion in a forward direction is rewarded and reinforced until the hexapod has pieced together enough information about its environment and its own capabilities to start to walk.  If the robot were to be damaged while crossing rough terrain on Mars or during a fight with some vicious alley cats, it would be able to learn how to walk on five legs.  It has an ability to stay balanced and stable in uneven surroundings.  I can imagine a hexapod or two being used under difficult or dangerous circumstances during construction, and I can also imagine an army of hexapods taking over planet Earth and making humans their slaves.

Intel was understandably delighted to find its Atom processor had made a walking spider robot possible, and has asked Bunting to build two hexapod robots for promotions at trade shows and other engineering meetings. The company plans to demo the robot at six events in February and March (Brown). You can follow Matt Bunting and Stewart Christie of Intel on twitter (@blegas78 and @intel_stewart, respectively) to find out more about the hexapod as it continues to develop.  I will leave you with this YouTube video of the robot moving around.  For more video, become a fan of the ARCHITERIALS facebook page, where I’ve provided a link to a documentary produced by Intel in which Bunting explains how the robot was created and what it can do.

UA RNSL Intel Hexapod: 3D Balance Gestures

WU XING:

This robot fits in the Fire and Wood categories because of how it works and the materials out of which it was made.  I think these kinds of robots will have an impact on how we construct buildings in the future.

Cited:

Brown, Pete. “Matt Bunting’s Hexapod Robot Hits the Road.”  Arizona Engineer_online 01/25/10.  Accesse 02/12/10.  URL.

Ross, Otto.  “Student Builds Spider Robot from Spare Parts (w/video).” Associated Press via Physorg.com 02/09/10.  Accessed 02/12/10.  URL.