Integrated Environmental Design and Robotic Fabrication Workflow for Ceramic Shading Systems

The current design practice for high performance, custom facade systems disconnects the initial façade design from the fabrication phase. The early design phases typically involve a series of iterative tests during which the environmental performance of different design variants is verified through simulations or physical measurements. After completing the environmental design, construction and fabrication constraints are incorporated. Time, budget constraints, and workflow incompatibilities are common obstacles that prevent design teams from verifying, through environmental analysis, that the final design still ‘works’. This paper presents an integrated environmental design and digital fabrication workflow for a custom ceramic shading system. Using the CAD environment Rhinoceros as a shared platform the process allows the design team to rapidly migrate between the environmental and the fabrication models. The recently developed DIVA plug-in for Rhinoceros allows for a seamless performance assessment of the facade in terms of daylight. Glare and annual energy use are addressed through connections to Radiance, Daysim and EnergyPlus simulations. A custom Grasshopper component and additional Rhino scripts were developed to link the environmentally optimized CAD file via Rapid code to a novel ceramic production process based on a 6-axis industrial robot. The resulting environmental design-to- manufacturing process was tested during the generation of a prototypical high performance ceramic shading system

Dynamic daylight control system implementing thin cast arrays of polydimethylsiloxane-based millimeter-scale transparent louvers

The deep building layouts typical in the U.S. have led to a nearly complete reliance on artificial lighting in standard office buildings. The development of daylight control systems that maximize the penetration and optimize the distribution of natural daylight in buildings has the potential for saving a significant portion of the energy consumed by artificial lighting, but existing systems are either static, costly, or obstruct views towards the outside. We report the Dynamic Daylight Control System (DDCS) that integrates a thin cast transparent polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS)-based deformable array of louvers and waveguides within a millimeter-scale fluidic channel system. This system can be dynamically tuned to the different climates and sun positions to control daylight quality and distribution in the interior space. The series of qualitative and quantitative tests confirmed that DDCS exceeds conventional double glazing system in terms of reducing glare near the window and distributing light to the rear of the space. The system can also be converted to a visually transparent or a translucent glazing by filling the channels with an appropriate fluid. DDCS can be integrated or retrofitted to conventional glazing systems and allow for diffusivity and transmittance control.Chemistry and Chemical Biolog

New stone shells: design and robotic fabrication

p. 1780-1789The research explores the design and analysis of a thin marble shell that incorporates the latest developments in fabrication technology and computational analysis. Natural stone, one of the oldest and most traditional building materials, is used in innovative ways by manipulating it with a 6-axis robotic waterjet. The research studies techniques for the robotic perforation and surfacing of natural stone, with a particular focus on marble. The work was conducted in collaboration with Monica Ponce de Leon and Wes McGee at the Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD). Small tests panels explore how transparency and translucency of stone can be generated through robotic waterjet cutting. A prototypical stone shell is designed to further explore the design potential encountered in the small test pieces. The shell is post-tensioned and stiffened with metal stiffeners. Finite-element analysis (FEA) serves as a primary technique to conduct a detailed structural analysis of the shell.Bechthold, M. (2009). New stone shells: design and robotic fabrication. Editorial Universitat Politècnica de València. http://hdl.handle.net/10251/681

Multi-Scalar Design: Material Matters

Presented on January 15, 2019 from 12:00 p.m.-1:00 p.m. in the Caddell Building, Flex Space, Georgia Tech.Trained as an architect, Martin Bechthold is the Kumagai Professor of Architectural Technology at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, and Associate Faculty at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering. He directs the Doctor of Design Program and co-directs the Master in Design Engineering (MDE) program. Bechthold is the founding director of the Materials Processes and Systems (MaP+S) Group, a collaborative team that pursues work to expand the role of materiality in the built environment, leveraging computational methods and robotics. Recent focus areas have been 3D printing and ceramics. Bechthold collaborates with Allen Sayegh and Joanna Aizenberg in the context of the Adaptive Living Environments (ALivE) group where material scientists and designers work together to develop novel adaptive materials for applications in products and buildings.Runtime: 59:56 minutesAdvances in material science, computation, and robotics are empowering the role materials can take in shaping buildings towards novel aesthetics and performative outcomes. Work at Harvard’s MaP+S group is investigating interventions from the nano-scale to the component scale, with materials that include ceramics as well as polymers and concrete

Modell zur Entscheidungsunterstützung von „Make or Buy“ in kleinen und mittelständischen Unternehmen

PeerReviewe

Pneumatically adaptive light modulation system (PALMS) for buildings

This research introduces a novel approach to control light transmittance based on flexible polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) films that have been plasma-treated such that micro-scale surface features have a visual effect as the film responds to applied strain. The effect is continuously tunable from optically clear (71.5% Transmittance over a 400-900 nm wavelength) to completely diffuse (18.1% T). Changes in the film's optical properties are triggered by bi-axial strains applied using a pneumatic system to form pressurized envelopes. This paper reports on a series of experimental studies and provides system integration research using prototypes, simulations and geometric models to correlate measured optical properties, strain, and global surface curvatures. In conclusion, a design is proposed to integrate PDMS light control within existing building envelopes.Chemistry and Chemical Biolog

Materials Education and Research in Art and Design: A New Role for Libraries - Session 2. Educators

Educators representing interactions with materials speak to critical approaches, life-cycle concerns, critical thinking of composition/process/properties

Genes and Enzymes Involved in Caffeic Acid Biosynthesis in the Actinomycete Saccharothrix espanaensis

The saccharomicins A and B, produced by the actinomycete Saccharothrix espanaensis, are oligosaccharide antibiotics. They consist of 17 monosaccharide units and the unique aglycon N-(m,p-dihydroxycinnamoyl)taurine. To investigate candidate genes responsible for the formation of trans-m,p-dihydroxycinnamic acid (caffeic acid) as part of the saccharomicin aglycon, gene expression experiments were carried out in Streptomyces fradiae XKS. It is shown that the biosynthetic pathway for trans-caffeic acid proceeds from l-tyrosine via trans-p-coumaric acid directly to trans-caffeic acid, since heterologous expression of sam8, encoding a tyrosine ammonia-lyase, led to the production of trans-p-hydroxycinnamic acid (coumaric acid), and coexpression of sam8 and sam5, the latter encoding a 4-coumarate 3-hydroxylase, led to the production of trans-m,p-dihydroxycinnamic acid. This is not in accordance with the general phenylpropanoid pathway in plants, where trans-p-coumaric acid is first activated before the 3-hydroxylation of its ring takes place