Venecia, en Italia, se está hundiendo. Para salvarla, Rachel Amstrong dice que necesitamos superar la arquitectura hecha de materiales inertes y hacer arquitectura que crezca por sí misma. Ella propone un material "no del todo vivo" que hace sus propias reparaciones y, además, captura el carbono.
TED Fellow Rachel Armstrong researches "metabolic materials" — construction materials that possess some of the properties of living systems, and can be manipulated to "grow" architecture.
Why you should listen to her:
Rachel Armstrong is a medical doctor, multi-media producer, science fiction author and arts collaborator. Her current research explores architectural design and mythologies about new technology. She is working with scientists and architects to explore cutting-edge, sustainable technologies.
Armstrong’s hope is that, in the future, cities will be able to replace the energy they draw from the environment, respond to the needs of their populations and eventually become regarded as "alive" — in the same way we think about parks or gardens. Since "metabolic materials" are made from terrestrial chemistry, they would not be exclusive to the developed world, and would have the potential to transform urban environments worldwide.
"Scientists need to work outside their own areas of expertise to make new technologies that are pertinent to the 21st century and to collaborate, both with other scientific disciplines and the arts and humanities."
Rachel Armstrong
Described as "cutting edge science based on experimental evidence", tomorrow I’ll be down at SciFi, London at a uniquely stimulating talk before disappearing on a bank hols Monday into my own research.
I’d strongly request you come down to Sci Fi London if you’ve any interest at peering at the future of the creation of life through artificial and synthetic life forms.
I’m chairing the debate – a fancy way of saying I’ll stay the heck away from any dense debate and let them continue uninterrupted. I got a degree in Applied chemistry, not a PHD
So it features some of the most respected figures in their field, two of whom I have come to know as cohorts on my research programme.
Dr Rachel Armstrong talking here about her cytoplasmic manifesto. The nub, gene theory to explain meaning of life is incomplete.
And then Bruce Damer whose work in simulating life through synthetic organisms has seen him work with Nasa, among others, will present his video.
Here’s the line up from the sci fi London Page
Profesor George Attard School of Chemistry, Southampton, whose diverse research activities span the traditional disciplines of physical chemistry/chemical physics, materials science, biochemistry and immunology.
Peter Bentley Popular Science author whose field of interest includes Evolutionary Computation, Engineering Design, Computer Art, and Artificial Life.
Rachel Armstrong SF author and doctor, who has appeared extensively in the media and at international conferences speculating on the future of humankind, non Darwinian techniques of evolution and the challenges of the extra-terrestrial environment.
Dr Rachel Armstrong
MA [Cantab] BMBCh [Oxon]
Personal Profile
Dr Rachel Armstrong is a writer, multimedia producer, television presenter, arts collaborator and general medical practitioner specializing in non-Darwinian techniques of evolution and the challenges of the extra-terrestrial environment. She regards the discipline of architecture as holding a unique place in the cultural imagination being simultaneously iconic and personal, and which offers an ideal forum to engage with and reimagine our experience of the world so that we can reinvent our role within it. She is a Teaching Fellow at the Bartlett and member of Professor Neil Spiller’s AVATAR Research Group, developing a new architectural methodology called Systems Architecture, which is which is the study of complexity within the discipline of the built environment that enables the convergence of the nano-bio-info-cogno technologies and extends from the macroscale flow of information to the micro scale organization of building materials. She has worked as a technical tutor at the Bartlett School of Architecture with students exploring the connections between biology, medicine and architecture. She was technical advisor to international performance artists such as Orlan and Stelarc on projects that explored the possibilities and implications of extreme anatomical and biotechnical modification and is the author and producer of a large range of multimedia projects and digital medical programmes ranging from printed literature to virtual reality and the Internet. Her first Science-Fiction novel ‘The Gray’s Anatomy’ was published in 2001 by Serpent’s Tail. She was also an editor of an Art & Design Issue entitled ‘Sci-Fi Aesthetics’, released in 1997 by Wiley-Academy, and ‘Space Architecture’ for Architectural Design in 2001. She has published extensively on post-human evolution and alien phenomena, working at the intersection of art, science and technology.
[http://www.sztuka-fabryka.be/mail-art/centre/texts74.htm]
Selected publications
‘The Gray’s Anatomy’ Serpent’s Tail, UK 2001. ISBN: 1852426357
[www.zone-sf.com/rachelarms.html]
[http://www.Octocon.com/2001/guests.php]
Masters of the Universe, Science, politics and the new space race (edited by Melissa Mean and James Wilsdon)
“Space Tourism” P58
Demos
Hendy Banks, London 2004
ISBN: 1-84180-119-4
[http://www.demos.co.uk/publications/masters]
MIR 2003
Extremeophiles, Surviving in Space
Short Story entitled ‘Extremeophiles’
By Dr Rachel Armstrong
The Arts Catalyst’s 3rd International Science & Art Conference.
In association with the ICA
Royal Institution, September 19, London 2003
[http://www.artscatalyst.org/projects/space/extremophiles.html]
The Cyborg Experiments:The Extensions of the Body in the Media Age
By Joanna Zylinska
Chapter 11, Anger, Art and Medicine: Working with Orlan, P172 -178
Published by Continuum International Publishing Group, 2002
ISBN 082645903X, 9780826459039
[http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=iWbtdujciTIC]
Architecture – the subject is matter (edited by Jonathan Hill)
“Wet Architecture” P 239-248
Taylor and Francis Books Ltd., Hampshire 2001
ISBN: 0415-2354-64
2001: Building for Space Travel (edited by John Zukowsky)
Harry Abrams Inc., Publishers in association with the Art Institute of Chicago
“The Future of Space Tourism” P 175-179
New York, 2001
ISBN: 0-8108-4490-1 (hardcover)
ISBN: 0-86559-188-1 (AIC pbk.)
I levitate, what’s next (edited by Aleksandra Kostic)
Association for Culture and Education KIBLA
Publisher Peter Domas Dobrila Edition TOX, Year 6, no 7
Print Solidarnost d.d, 2000
Slovenia
ISBN: 961-6304-03-8
http://leonardo.info/reviews/sep2110/bk_LEVITATE_pepperell.html
Space Architecture (edited by Rachel Armstrong)
Architectural Design
Vol 70 No 2 March 2000
John Wiley & Sons Ltd., New York
ISBN: 0-471-86438-2
[http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=NEsMAAAACAAJ&dq=space+architecture+AD+Armstrong]
Body Probe
Torture Garden 2 – Mutant Flesh and Cyber Primitives
Edited by David Wood
Alien Abduction and Sex in Space by Dr Rachel Armstrong
Publisher:
Creation Books; 1 edition (December 15, 1999)
Language:
English
ISBN-10:
1840680040,
ISBN-13:
978-1840680041
[http://our-alternatives.com/Articles/tabid/178/ContentID/452/MenuID/132/Default.aspx]
Sci-Fi Aesthetics (edited by Dr Rachel Armstrong)
Art & Design
Profile No 56
Academy Group Ltd.
London, 1997
ISBN: 0-471-97855-8
[http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=z6UHAAAACAAJ&dq=sci-fi+aesthetics+armstrong]
Totally Wired: Science, Technology and the Human Form
By Dr Rachel Armstrong
Publishers, Institute of Contemporary Arts,
London, 16 Apr-13 May 1996)
ISBN-13:
9781900300056,
ISBN-10:
1900300052
[http://www.foyles.co.uk/display.asp?K=9781900300056&DS=Totally-Wired]
Punk Science
Dr Rachel Armstrong
Cybersociology Issue Five
[www.cybersociology.com/files/5_punksciencearmstrong.html]
Cyborg Film Making
Dr Rachel Armstrong
Cybersociology Issue Five
[http://www.cybersociology.com/files/5_cyborgfilmmaking.html]
Medicine and the Media: Surgery as Satire
Dr Rachel Armstrong
BMJ
1996;312:1308 (18 May)
[http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/312/7041/1308]
Orlan: Public Money and Public Profile
By Dr Rachel Armstrong
Submitted by
mute
on Thursday, 2 October, 2008
[http://www.metamute.org/en/content/orlan]
"Post-Human Evolution," Artifice
Dr Rachel Armstrong, P 53-63
Black Dog Publishers, London (1995)
[http://www.stanford.edu/class/history34q/readings/Orlan/Orlan.html]
More Women Travel : Adventures and Advice from More Than 60 Countries
by Natania Jansz, Miranda Davies
‘A Troubled Guest’ by Dr Rachel Armstrong
Rough Guides (Firm)
Published by Distributed by Penguin Books USA, 1995
ISBN 1858280982, 9781858280981
[http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=k7QBAAAACAAJ&dq=more+women+travel]
Rachel Armstrong on the Web
Website: Rachel Armstrong at the Bartlett
Website: Cytoplasmic Manifesto
Website: Human Reproduction in Space