Material Ecology is an emerging field in science pioneered by Neri Oxman, who leads the Mediated Matter research group as a professor and designer at the MIT Media Lab. As the cross-section of materials science, digital fabrication technologies, and organic design, Material Ecology strives to intertwine human-made structures with their environments at a resolution that matches nature.
Author: Ben Park Editor: Haryeong Eo, Yunjin Jung
Material Ecology is an emerging field in science pioneered by Neri Oxman, who leads the Mediated Matter research group as a professor and designer at the MIT Media Lab. As the cross-section of materials science, digital fabrication technologies, and organic design, Material Ecology strives to intertwine human-made structures with their environments at a resolution that matches nature.
A key point Oxman stresses with the Material Ecology approach is “growing” products or buildings. A built environment with predefined functions creates an artificial and inanimate structure, becoming permanent waste when its function is served or outlived. This is why plastic, wood, glass, and metal are rarely recycled, whereas the Material Ecology design is “grown” as opposed to “built” because it is derived from organic matter.
The 5-meter-tall structure is made of biobased structural materials called biopolymers, which are natural polymers produced by the cells of living organisms. These materials have already been utilized for tissue engineering, regenerative medicine, and even in fashion.
However, in order to deploy them on an architectural scale, Oxman’s team invested in design and construction technologies that emulated their hierarchical properties in nature by engineering real-time chemical formation.
The molecular components consist of cellulose, chitin, and pectin, which are the same materials found in trees, crustaceans, and apple skin respectively; these natural systems embody an extensive array of functional materials that outperform human engineered ones through their resilience, sustainability, and adaptability (Oxman, 2020). Through parametric chemistry – scaling structural functional relationships found in trees and crustaceans - Oxman’s team believes they will be able to architect buildings, just like the full-scale tower of Aguahoja, as living structures that are able to adapt and respond to their environment.
Neri Oxman led her team to create tunable biopolymer composites to subvert the toxic waste cycle. The biopolymers used on the surface of Aguahoja are tunable in their visual, olfactory, and gustatory properties because each surface with natural pigments was controlled to different exposures to various lighting and humidity. Aguahoja’s biocompatible architectural skin-and-shell represents a step towards the ideal future where the “grown and manufactured unite” (The Museum of Modern Art [MoMA], 2020). It is imperative to find an alternative to plastic, as over 300 tons of plastic are produced globally each year, with less than 10% of it being recycled (UNEP, n.d.).
The renewable, biocompatible polymers used in Aguahoja embody the idea of “water to water” by leveraging the power of natural resource cycles, as the tree becomes a tower and the tower regrows the tree. This is because the biopolymers can be made to decay, returning to earth for the purpose of fueling new growth like plants. Therefore, the Material Ecology approach in consideration for the formation and decay of design is embraced by Aguahoja. While the heat and humidity of the environment naturally modulate the properties of the materials of the outer shell, upon death these materials fuel new life by biodegrading in water. In the same nature, the biocompatible surface of Aguahoja is able to degrade itself back into its original state of water after serving its purpose. This is the key idea that sets Material Ecology apart: a design that is grown and not built.
Works Cited
Aguahoja, Southeast Elevation. (2021). Retrieved April 6, 2022, from https://oxman.com/projects/aguahoja.
Kalina, N. (2017). Neri Oxman. Retrieved April 23, 2022, from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Neri_Oxman_by_Noah_Kalina.jpg.
Neri Oxman. Aguahoja. (2020). Retrieved April 24, 2022, from https://oxman.com/projects/aguahoja
Neri Oxman: Material ecology exhibition galleries: Magazine: Moma. The Museum of Modern Art. (2020). Retrieved April 23, 2022, from https://www.moma.org/magazine/articles/315
Visual feature: Beat plastic pollution. UNEP. (n.d.). Retrieved April 6, 2022, from https://www.unep.org/interactives/beat-plastic-pollution/
Comentarios