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Language: en
whenever we start a new project it has
to have these ingredients of
simultaneous complexity it has to be
novel in terms of the synthetic biology
Material Science robotics engineering
all of these elements that are
discipline based or rooted must be novel
if you can combine novelty in synthetic
biology with a novelty in robotics with
a novelty in Material Science with a
novelty and computational design you are
bound to create something novel
the following is a conversation with
Nary oxman an engineer scientist
designer architect artist and one of the
kindest most thoughtful and Brilliant
human beings I've ever gotten to know
for a long time she led the mediated
Mata group at MIT that did research and
built incredible stuff at the
intersection of computational design
digital fabrication Material Science and
synthetic biology doing so at all scales
from the micro scale to the building
scale now she's continuing this work at
a very new company for now called oxman
looking to revolutionize how humans
design and build products working with
nature not against it
on a personal note let me say that Nary
has for a long time been a friend and
someone who in my darker moments has
always been there with a note of
kindness and support I am forever
grateful to her she's a brilliant and a
beautiful human being oh and she also
brought me a present War and Peace by
Tolstoy and meditations by Marcus
Aurelius it doesn't get better than that
this is Alex Friedman podcast to support
it please check out our sponsors in the
description and now dear friends here's
Nery oxman
let's start with the universe
you ever think of the universe as a kind
of machine that designs beautiful things
at multiple scales I I do
um and I think of nature in that way in
general
in the context of design specifically
I think of nature as everything that
isn't anthropomas everything that is not
produced by humankind
the birds and the rocks and everything
in between fungi elephants whales do you
think there's an intricate ways in which
there's a connection between humans and
nature yes and we're looking for it
I think that from let's say from the
beginning of mankind uh going back 200
000 years the products that we have
designed have separated us from nature
and it's ironic that the things that we
designed and produced as humankind those
are exactly the things that separated us
before that we were we were totally in
complete completely connected
and I want to return to that world but
bring the tools of engineering and
computation to it yes yes I absolutely
believe that there is so much to Nature
that that we still have not leveraged
and we still have not understood and we
still haven't and so much of our work is
designed but a lot of it is science is
unveiling and
um and and finding new truths about the
natural world that we were not aware
before everybody talks about
intelligence these days but I like to
think that nature has
kind of wisdom that exists Beyond
intelligence or above intelligence and
it's that wisdom that we're trying to
tap into through technology if you think
about humans versus nature at least in
the realm at least in the context of
definition of
nature is everything but
um anthropo mass and I'm using on Milo
who is an incredible
Professor from The weissmann Institute
who came up with this definition of
entropomas in 2020
when he identified that 2020 was the
crossover year when anthropomas exceeded
biomass on the planet so all of the
design Goods that we have created and
brought into the world now outweigh all
of the biomass
including of course all Plastics and
wearables building cities but also
asphalt and
concrete all outweigh the scale of the
biomass and actually that was a moment
you know how in life there are moments
that
be a handful of moments that get you to
course correct and and my it was a zoom
conversation with Ron and that was a
moment for me
um when I realized that that imbalance
now we've superseded the biomass on the
planet where do we go from here
and you've heard the expression more
more phones than bones and the
entropomas and the antropocene
um and and the technosphere sort of
outweighing the biosphere
um but now we are really trying to look
at is is there a way
in which all things technosphere are
designed as if as if they are part of
the biosphere meaning if you could today
grow instead of build everything and
anything if you could grow an iPhone if
you could grow a car
what would that world look like where
the touring test for sort of this this
kind of I call this material ecology
approach but this this notion that
everything material everything that you
design in the physical universe
can be read
and written to as or thought of or
perceived of as nature grown that's sort
of the touring test for for the company
or at least that's how I started I
thought well grow everything that's sort
of the slogan let's grow everything
and if we grow everything is there a
world in which driving a car is better
for nature than a world in which there
are no cars is there is it possible that
a world in which you build buildings in
cities that those buildings and cities
actually augment and heal nature as
opposed to their absence is there a
world in which we now go back to that
kind of synergy between nature and
humans where you cannot separate between
grown and made and it doesn't even
matter
is there a good term for the
intersection between biomass and
entropyl mass like things that are grown
yeah so in 2005 I I called this material
ecology I thought what if all material
all things materials would be considered
part of the ecology and would have an
impact a positive impact on the ecology
um where we work together to help each
other all things nature all things human
and again you can say that that wisdom
in nature exists in fungi many mushroom
lovers always contest my thesis here and
saying well we have the mushroom Network
and we have the mother trees and they're
all connected and and why don't we just
simply hack into into mushrooms well
first of all yes they're connected but
that Network stops when there is a
physical Gap that Network
does not necessarily enable the the
whales in the in the Dominican to
connect with an olive tree in Israel to
connect with a weeping willow in Montana
and that's sort of a world that that I'm
dreaming about what what does it mean
for nature to have access
to the cloud at the kind of bandwidth
that we're talking about sort of think
neuralink for nature you know since the
um first computer uh the um and you know
this by heart probably better than I do
but we're both MIT lifers
um we today have computational power
that is
um one trillion times the power that we
had in in those times we have
26.5 trillion times the bandwidth
and
11.5 quintillion uh times the memory
which is incredible so humankind since
the since the first computer has
approach and accessed such incredible
bandwidth
and we're asking what if nature had that
bandwidth so beyond genes and evolution
if there was a way to augment nature and
allow it access to the world of bits
what does nature look like now
and can nature
make decisions for herself as opposed to
being guided and guarded and abused by
by humankind so Nature has this inherent
wisdom that you spoke to but you're also
referring to augmenting that inherent
wisdom with something like a large
language model exactly so compress human
knowledge but also maintain whatever is
that intricate wisdom that allows plants
bacteria fungi to grow incredible things
at arbitrary scales adapting to whatever
environment and just surviving and
thriving no matter where no matter how
exactly so I think of it as large
molecule models and those large molecule
models of course large language models
are based on the on Google and search
engines and and so on and so forth and
we don't have this data currently and
part of our mission is is to do just
that trying to
quantify and understand
the language that exists across all
Kingdoms of Life across all five
kingdoms of life
and if we can understand that language
is there a way for us to First make
sense of it find logic in it and then
generate certain computational tools
that Empower nature to to build better
crops to to increase the level of
biodiversity in in the company we're
constantly asking what does nature want
like what what
does nature want from a compute view if
it knew it what what could Aid it and
whatever the heck it's wanting to do
yeah so we keep coming back to this
answer of nature wants to increase
information
but decrease entropy right so find order
but constantly increase the information
scale and and this is true for what our
work also tries to do because we're
constantly trying to
fight against the dimensional mismatch
between things made and things grown
right and and as designers we are
educated to think in X Y and Z and
that's pretty much where architectural
education ends and biological education
begins so in reducing that dimensional
mismatch we're missing out on
opportunities to create things made as
if grown but in the natural environment
we're asking can we provide nature with
these extra dimensions and again I I'm
not sure what nature wants but I'm
curious as to what happens when you
provide these tools to the Natural
environments obviously with
responsibility obviously with control
obviously with ethics and and moral code
um but is there a world in which nature
can help fix itself uh using those tools
and by the way we're talking about a
company called oxman yeah I'll just just
a few words about the team yeah what
kind of humans work at a place like this
they're trying to figure out what nature
wants you know I think they're first
like you they're they're humanists first
um they come from different disciplines
and different disciplinary backgrounds
and just as an example we have a
brilliant designer who is just a
mathematical genius and a computer
scientist and a mechanical engineer who
has trained
um as a synthetic biologist and
um and now we're hiring a microbiologist
and a chemist
architects of course and designers uh
roboticist so it's really it's Noah's
Ark right two of each and always dancing
between this line of the artificial the
synthetic and the and the real what's
the term for in the natural yeah the
built in the grown nature and culture
technology and biology but we're we're
constantly seeking to to ask how can we
build design and deploy products in
three scales the molecular scale which
I've briefly hinted to
um and their and the molecular scale
we're really looking to understand
whether there is a universal language to
Nature and what that language is and
then build build a tool that
um I think and dream of it is the iPhone
for nature if nature had an iPhone
um what would that iPhone look like does
that mean creating an interface
between nature and the computational
tools we have exactly it goes back to
that 11.5 quintillion times the
bandwidth that that humans have have now
arrived at and and giving that to Nature
and seeing what you know what what
happens there can animals actually use
this interface to know that they need to
run away from fire can plants use this
interface to increase the rate of
photosynthesis in the presence of a
smoke cloud can they do this
quote-unquote automatically without a
kind of a top-down Brute Force policy
based method that's authored and
deployed by humans and so this work
really relates to that interface with
the natural world and then there's a
second area in the company which focuses
on growing products
and here we're focusing on a single
product that starts from CO2
um it becomes a product it's consumed
it's used it's worn by a human and then
it
um goes back to the soil and it grows an
edible fruit plant so we're talking
about from CO2 to fruit yeah it starts
from CO2 and it ends with something that
you can like literally eat so so the
world's first entirely biodegradable
bi-compatible by renewable product
that's grown yes either using plant
matter or using bacteria but we are
really looking at um carbon recycling
technologies that start with methane or
Wastewater
um and end with this wonderful
Reincarnation of a an a thing that
doesn't need to end up in a composting
site but can just be thrown into the
ground and grow Olive and find peace and
there's a lot of textile based work out
there that is focused on one single
element in this long chain like oh let's
create
um you know leather out of mycelium or
or less create textile out of cellulose
but then it stops there and you get to
assembling the shoe or the wearable and
you and you you need a little bit of
glue and you need a little bit of this
material a little bit of that material
to to make it water resistant and then
it's over so that's one thing that we're
trying to solve for is how to create a
product that is materially
computationally robotically novel
um and goes through all of these phases
from the creation from this carbon
recycling technology to
um to the product to literally how do
you think about you know Reinventing an
industry that is focused on assembly and
putting things together and using humans
to do that can that you know can that
happen just using robots and microbes
and that's it and doing it end to end I
would love to see what this Factory
looks like and the factories is great
too I'm I'm very very excited in October
we'll we'll share first
um first Renditions of of some of this
working in February we'll we'll invite
you to the lab I'm there and I've
already applied I haven't heard back I
don't understand okay uh I mean it's
just before we get to number three it'd
be amazing to just talk about what it
takes with robotic arms or in general
the whole process of how to build the
life form stuff you've done in the past
maybe stuff you're doing now how to use
bacteria it's kind of synthetic biology
how to grow stuff by leveraging bacteria
is there examples from the past and yes
and just take a step back over the 10
years of the mediated matter group which
was my group at MIT
um has sort of dedicated itself to
biobased design would be a suitcase word
but sort of thinking about that Synergy
between nature and culture biology and
technology and we attempted to build a
suite of embodiments let's say that they
ended up in amazing museums and amazing
shows and and we wrote patents and
papers on them but they were still n of
ones again the challenge as you say was
to grow them and we classified them into
fibers cellular solids biopolymers
pigments and in each of the examples
although the material was different
sometimes we used fibers sometimes we
used silk with silkworms and honey with
bees and or comb as the structural
material with Vespers we used
synthetically engineered bacteria to
produce pigments although the materials
were different and the hero organisms
were different the philosophy was always
the same the approach was really an
approach of computational templating
that templating allowed us to create
templates for the natural environment
where nature and Technology could
duet could dance together to create
these products so just a few examples
with a silk Pavilion we've had a couple
of pavilions made of silk and the second
one which was the bigger one which ended
up at the Museum of Modern Art with my
friend an incredible Mentor Paul
Antonelli that Pavilion was six meter
tall and it was produced by silkworms
and and there we had
um different types of templates there
were physical templates that were
basically just these water-soluble
meshes upon which the silkworms were
spinning and then there were
environmental templates which was a
robot basically applying a variation of
environmental conditions such as heat
and light to guide the movement of the
silkworm you're saying so many amazing
things and I'm trying not to interrupt
you but like one of the things you've
learned by observing by doing science on
these is that the environment defines
the shape that they create or
contributes or intricately plays with
the shape to create and so so like and
you get to that's one of the ways you
can get to guide their work is by
defining that environment by the way you
said hero organism which is an epic term
so that means like because whatever is
the biological living system that's uh
doing the creation and that's what's
happening in Pharma and and biomaterials
and by the way Precision Ag and and food
new food design Technologies as people
are betting on a hero organism is the
sort of how I think of it and and and
and the hero organism is sometimes it's
the palm oil or or it's a it's the
mycelium there's a lot of mushrooms
around for good and bad and and it's
cellulose or
it's you know fake bananas or the the
Workhorse E coli but these hero
organisms are being vetted on as like
the
what's the one answer that solves
everything Hitchhiker's Guide 42 42 yeah
these are sort of the 42s of of you know
of the enchanted new universe and back
at MIT we said instead of betting on all
of these organisms
let's approach them as almost like
movement in a symphony and let's kind of
lean into
what we can learn from each of these
organisms in the context of building a
project in an architectural scale and
those usually were Pavilions and then
the competition of templating is the way
you guide the work of this how many did
you say 17 000 17
532 so each of these silkworms threads
are about you know one one mile
um in distance and and and they're
they're beautiful and when and just
thinking about the amount of material
you know it's a bit like thinking about
them you know the the length of
capillary
vessels that grow in your belly when
you're pregnant to feed that incredible
new life form
um it's just nature is amazing but back
to the silkworms I think I had three
months
um to build this incredible Pavilion but
um we couldn't figure out how we were
thinking of emulating the process of how
a silkworm goes about building its
incredible architecture this cocoon over
the period of 24 to 72 hours
and it builds a cocoon basically to
protect itself it's it's a beautiful
form of architecture and it uses pretty
much just two materials two chemical
compound saracen and fibrin the saracen
is sort of the glue of of the Cocoon the
fibroid is the fiber base material of
the coconut through fibers and glue and
that's true for so many systems in
nature lots of fiber and glue and that
architecture allows them to
metamorphosize and in the process they
vary the properties of that silk thread
so it's stiffer or softer depending on
where it is in the section of the Cocoon
and so we were trying to emulate this
robotically with a 3D printer that was
six axis Kuka arm one of these baby
kookas and we're trying to emulate that
process computationally and build
something very large when one of my
students now
um a brilliant Industrial Engineer
roboticist on my team Marcus said well
you know we were just playing with those
silkworms and enjoying their presence
when we realized that
if they're placed on a desk or a
horizontal surface they will go about
creating their cocoon only the Cocoon
would be flat
because they're constantly looking for a
vertical Post in order to use that post
as an anchor to spin the Cocoon but in
the absence of that post
on surfaces that are less than 21
millimeters and flat they will spin flat
patches and we say aha
let's work with them to produce this
this Dome
as a set of flat patches and a silkworm
mind you is a is quite an egocentric
creature
um and actually the furthest you go you
move forward in evolution by natural
selection the more
um egoism you find in creatures so when
you think about termites right they the
their material sophistication is is
actually very primitive but they have
incredible ability to communicate and
connect with each other so if you think
about the entire All of Me All of nature
let's say all of living systems as like
a matrix that runs across two axes one
is material sophistication which is
terribly relevant for designers and the
other is communication
um uh the the termites Ace on
communication but their material
sophistication is crap right it's just
saliva and feces and some soil particles
that are built to create these
incredible termite Mounds at the scale
that when compared to human skyscrapers
transcend all of buildable skills uh at
least in in terms of what we have today
in architectural practice just in
relative to the size of the termite but
when you look at the silkworm
the silkworm has zero connection
communication across silkworms they were
not designed to connect and communicate
with each other they're they're sort of
a human design species because the the
uh the domesticated silk moth uh creates
the Cocoon we then produce the silk of
it and then it dies
um so the it has dysfunctional Wings it
cannot fly it's not so so and and that's
another problem that the sericulture
um industry has is why did we in the
first place author this organism four
thousand years ago that is unable to fly
and is just there
um to basically live as
um to serve a human need which is
textiles and so here we were fascinated
by the computational kind of biology
dimension of silkworms but along the way
by the way this is great I never get to
tell the full story
so much I always I'm always like people
say oh
paragraphs they're way too long and this
is wonderful this is like heaven
you're driving so many good lines but
but but really those uh those silkworms
are not yes they're not designed to be
like humans right they're not designed
to connect communicate and build things
that are bigger than themselves through
connection and communication so what
happens when you add 17 000 of them
communicating effects that's a really
great question what happens is that at
some point
the templating strategies and as you
said correctly there were geometrical
templating material templating
environmental templating chemical
templating if you're using pheromones to
guide the movement of bees
in the absence of a queen where you have
a robotic Queen
um but whenever you have these
templating strategies you have sort of
control over nature right but the
question is is there a world in which we
can move from templating from providing
these computational
material and immaterial physical and
molecular platforms that guide nature
almost like guiding a product almost
like a gardener
um to a problem or an opportunity of
emergence where that biological organism
assumes agency by virtue of accessing
the robotic code and saying now I own
the code I get to do what I want with
this code let me show you what this
Pavilion may look like or this product
may look like and I think one of the
exciting moments for us is when we
realized that these robotic platforms
that were designed initially as
templates actually inspired if if I may
a kind of a
collaboration and cooperation between
silkworms that are not a swarm based
organism they're not like the bees on
the termites they don't work together
and they don't have you know social
orders amongst them the queen and the
drones Etc they're they're all this the
same in a way right and and here uh what
was so exciting for us is that these
computational and Fabrication
Technologies enable the silkworm to uh
sort of to to kind of hop hop from from
the branch in Ecology of of of worms to
the branch and Ecology of maybe
human-like intelligence where they could
connect and communicate by virtue of
you know feeling or rubbing against each
other in in an area that was hotter or
colder and they were so the product that
we got at the end the variation of
density of fiber and the distribution of
the fiber and the transparency the
product at the end seems like it was
produced by a swarm silk Community but
of course it wasn't it's a bunch of
biological agents working together to
assemble this thing that's really really
fascinating to us how can technology
um
augment or enable a swarm-like behavior
and creatures that have not been
designed to work as swarms so how do you
construct a computational template from
which
uh a certain kind of thing emerges so
how can you predict what emerges I
suppose so if you can predict it it
doesn't count as emergence actually
that's a deeply poetic line we can talk
about it I mean it's a bit like this
concentrated it doesn't count that's
right right speaking of emergence
an empowerment because we're constantly
uh
um moving between those as if they're
equals in the on the team and one of
them Kristoff shared with me a
mathematical equation for what does it
mean to empower nature and what is
empowerment in nature look like
um
and that relates to emergence and we can
go back to emergence in a few moments
but I want to I want to say it so that I
know that I've learned it
and if I've learned it I can use it
later yeah and maybe you'll figure
something out as you said of course
Kristoff is the master here but but
really
we were thinking again what does nature
want nature wants um
nature wants to increase the information
Dimension and reduce entropy
um what do we want we kind of want the
same thing we want more but
um we want order right and this goes
back to your conversation with your
shavat stochastic versus deterministic
languages or processes his definition or
the definition he found
um
was that an agent is empowered
if the entropy of the distribution of
all of it states it's high while the
entropy of the distribution of a single
state given a choice given an action is
low meaning it's that kind of uh
um
yeah Duality between opportunity like
starting like this and going like this
opening and closing and and this really
I think is analogous to to human
empowerment given uh infinite wide array
of choices what is the choice that you
make uh to
you know to to enable to empower uh to
provide you with with the agency that
you need and how much is that making
that choice actually control the
trajectory of the system that's really
nice so this this applies to all the
kinds of systems you're talking about
yeah and
to a human on an individual basis but or
a silk or more a b
um or a microbe a microbe that has
agency or by virtue of of of a template
but it also applies to a community of of
organisms like the bees
um and so we've done a lot of work sort
of moving from you've asked how to grow
things so we've grown things uh using
um co-fabrication where we're digitally
fabricating with other organisms that
live across the various Kingdoms of Life
and and those were silkworms and bees
and uh and with bees
um which we've sent to outer space and
we turned healthily and they were
reproductive okay you're gonna have to
tell that story you're gonna have to
talk about the robotic queen and the
pheromones come on like
um so we've built what we called a
synthetic apiary and the synthetic
apiary was designed uh as an environment
that was a Perpetual spring environment
for the bees of Massachusetts they go on
hibernation of course during the winter
season
um and then we lose 80 percent of them
or more uh during that period we're
thinking okay what if we created this
environment where
um before you template right before you
can design with you have to design four
right you have to create this space of
mutualism space of sort of shared
connection between you and the organism
and with bees it started as the
synthetic apiary and we have proven that
that curated environment where we
designed the space with high levels of
control of temperature humidity and
light and we've proven that they were
reproductive and alive and we realized
wow this environment that we created can
help augment bees in the winter season
in any City around the world where where
bees survive and thrive in the summer
and spring seasons and could this be a
kind of a new Urban typology an
architectural typology of symbiosis of
mutualism between organisms and humans
where these are by the way the synthetic
apiary was in a co-op in you know nearby
Somerville we had you know we had robots
our team you know slept there every day
with our with our tools and machines and
we made it happen and the neighbors were
very happy and and they got to get a ton
of Honey at the end of the winter and
and those bees of course were released
into the wild at the end of the winter
Alive and Kicking so then in order to
actually experiment with with the
robotic Queen
an idea or concept we had to prove
obviously that we can create this space
for uh for bees and then after that we
had this amazing opportunity to send the
bees to space on Blue Shepherd mission
that is part of blue origin and we of
course said yes we'll take a slot we
said okay can we outdo NASA so NASA in
1982 had an experiment where they sent b
b's to to outer space the bees returned
they were not reproductive and um
and some of them died and and we thought
well is there a way in which we can
create a life support system almost like
a small mini bio lab of a queen and her
retinue
um that would be sent in this blue
origin new Shepherd Mission uh in this
one cell and and so that's if the
synthetic APO is an architectural
project in this case this second
synthetic apiary was a product it was
right so from an from an architectural
controlled environment to a product
scale control environment and this bio
lab this life support system for bees
was designed to provide the bees with
all the conditions that they needed and
and we looked at that time at the
national pheromone that the queen uses
to guide the other bees and we looked at
pheromones that are associated with a b
and thinking of those pheromones being
released inside the capsules that go the
capsule that goes to outer space they
returned um back to our the media lab
roof and those bees were alive and
kicking and reproductive and you know
and they continue to create comb and and
it ended with a beautiful nature paper
that the team and I published together
we gave them gold nanoparticles and
silver nanoparticles because we were
interested if if bees recycle wax it was
known
forever that bees do not recycle the wax
and by feeding them these gold
nanoparticles we were able to prove that
um that the bees actually do recycle the
wax the reason I'm bringing this forward
is because
we don't view ourselves as designers of
consumable products and and
Architectural environments only but we
love that moment where these
Technologies and by the way every one of
these projects that we created
involve the creation of a new technology
whether it be a glass printer or the
spinning robot or
or the
um life support system for for the bee
Colony they all involved a technology
that was associated with the the project
and I never ever ever want to let that
part go because I love love technology
so much
um and but but also another element of
this is it always these projects if
they're great they reveal new knowledge
about or new science about
um the topic that that you're
investigating be it you know
silkworms or or bees or or glass that's
why I say I always tell my team it
should be at MoMA and the cover of
nature are science at the same time we
don't separate between the art and the
science it's it's it's it's one of the
same so as you're creating the uh the
art you're going to learn something
about these organisms or something about
these materials I mean is there
something that stands out to you about
these hero organisms like bees silkworms
you mentioned E coli has its pros and
cons this bacteria what have you learned
that small or big that's interesting
about these organisms yeah it's a
beautiful question what have I learned
I've learned that
um
you know uh we did we also worked with
shrimp shells with ago how we built this
tower on the roof of SF Momo which by
um a couple of months ago and until it
was on the roof we we've shown the
structure completely biodegraded into
then well not completely but almost
completely biodegrade to the soil and
um and this notion that a product or
part an organism or part of that
organism can reincarnate is very very
moving thought to me because I
want to believe that I believe in
reincarnation I want to believe that I
believe yeah that's my relationship with
God I want to I want I I like to believe
in believing most great things in life
are second derivatives of things but
that's part of another conversation I
feel like that's a quote that's gonna
take weeks to really internalize that
that notion of I want you to want or I
need you to need or
um that that that it there's always
something a deeper truth behind what is
on the surface and so I like to go to
the second and
tertiary derivative of things and and
discover new truths about them through
that but what have I learned about
organisms and why don't you like E coli
I like E coli and and a lot of the work
that we've done uh was
possible without are working on E coli
or other Workhorse organisms like
cyanobacteria how are bacteria used
Death Masks the Death Masks so what are
Death Masks so we did this project
called Vespers and those were basically
death masks that was said as a process
for designing a living product what
happens and we looked at bit I looked at
the remember looking at Beethoven's
death mask and agamemnon's death mask
and just studying how they were created
and really they were sort of
geometrically attuned to the face of the
dead and what we wanted to do is create
a death mask that not was not based in
the sh in was not based on the shape of
of the of the wear but rather it was
based on their legacy and their biology
and maybe we could
um harness a few stem cells there for
future Generations or contain the last
breath Lazarus which preceded Vespers
was project where we designed a mask to
contain a single breath The Last Breath
of the wearer and again if I had access
to these Technologies today I would
totally
re-incorporate my grandmother's last
breath in in in in in a in a product so
it was like an air Memento so with
Vespers we um
we actually used E coli to
um to to create pigmented masks masks
whose pigments uh would be recreated at
the surface of the mask and
I'm skipping over a lot of content but
basically there were 15 masks and they
were created as three sets The Masks of
the past the mask of the present and the
mask of the future
um The Masks there were five five and
five and the mass of the past were based
on
um ornaments and they were
um
embedded with natural minerals like gold
yes yes yes and we're looking at
pictures of these and they're gorgeous
yes extremely delicate and interesting
fractal patterns that are symmetrical
they look symmetrical but they're not
this is intense this is we intended for
you to be tricked and think that they're
all symmetrical but there's
imperfections there are imperfections by
Design
all of these
um
all of these forms and shapes and
distribution of matter that you're
looking at was was entirely designed
using a computational program so none of
it is manual
um but long story short the first
collection is about the surface of the
mask and the second collection which
you're looking at is about the volume of
the mask and and and what happens to the
mask when all the colors from the
surface yes enter the volume of the mask
inside create pockets and channels to
guide life through them
um they were Incorporated with pigment
producing living organisms and then
those organisms were templated to
recreate the patterns of the original
death masks and so life recycles and
re-biggins and so on and so forth the
past meets the future the future meets
the past from the surface to the volume
from Death to life to death to life to
death to life and that again is a
recurring theme in in the projects that
that we take on but there from a
technological perspective what was
interesting is that we embedded chemical
signals in the jet in the printer and
those chemical signals
um basically interacted with the
um pigment producing bacteria uh in in
this case E coli that were introduced on
the surface of the mask and those
interactions between the chemical
signals inside the resins and the
bacteria at the surface of the mask at
the resolution that is native to the
printer in this case 20 microns per
voxel allowed us to compute the exact
patterns that we wanted to achieve and
we thought well if we can do this with
pigments can we do this with antibiotics
if we can do this with antibiotics could
we do it with with melanin and what are
the implications again this is a
platform technology now that we have it
what are the actual real world
implications and potential applications
for this technology and we started a new
area of one of my students Rachel
her PhD thesis uh was entire was titled
after this new class of materials that
we created through this project Vespers
hybrid living materials hlms
um and these hybrid living materials
really paved the way towards a whole
other set of products that we've
designed uh like
um like the work that we did with
melanin for for the Mandela Pavilion
that we presented at sfmoma
um where again we're using the same
principles of templating in this case
not silkworms and not bees but we're
templating bacteria at a much much
um much a more finer resolution and now
instead of templating using using a
robot or templating using a printer but
compute is very very much part of it and
the what's nice about bacteria of course
is that
um from an ethical perspective I think
there's a range right so at the end of
the silk Pavilion I got an email from
Professor in Japan who has been working
on transgenic silk and said well if you
did this this create amazing silk
Pavilion why don't we create
um
um you know glow in the light silk
dresses and and in order to create this
glow in the light uh silk we need to
um you know to to to to to apply
um uh genes that are taken from a spider
to a silkworm and this is what is known
as a transgenic operation and we said no
and that was for us a clear decision
that no we will work with these
organisms as long as we know that what
we are doing with them is not only
better for humans but it's also better
for them and and again just to remind
you where
um I forget the exact number but it's
around a thousand cocoons per single
shirt that are exterminated in in India
and China and in those Seri culture
industries that are being abused now yes
this organism this organism was was
designed to serve the human species and
maybe we should maybe it's time you know
to
to to retire that you know that
conception of of organisms that are
designed for a human-centric world or
human-centric set of applications I I
don't feel the same way about E coli
um I not that I'm agnostic organism
agnostic but but still I believe there's
so much for us to do on this planet with
um with with bacteria and so in general
Your Design principle is to uh
grow cool stuff as a byproduct of the
organism flourishing so not yes not
using the organism the win-win the
Synergy a hole that's bigger than the
sum of its parts it's interesting I mean
it just feels like a gray area where
genetic modification of an organism
it just feels like I don't know if you
if you genetically modified me to make
me glow in the light
I think you have enough of an aura all
right thank you that was I was just
fishing for compliments thank you I
appreciate it so absolutely right and by
the way the gray area is you know is
where some of us like to live and and
like to thrive and and that's okay and
and thank goodness that there's so many
of us that that like the black and white
and that thrive in the black and white
my husband is a good example for that
well but just to clarify in this case
you're also trying to thrive in the
black and white in that you're saying
like the silkworm is a beautiful
wonderful creature let us not modify it
is that the idea or is it okay to modify
a little bit as long as we can see that
it benefits the organism as well as the
final creation uh so with silkworms
absolutely let's not modify it
genetically let's not modify genetically
um
and then some because why did we why did
we get there to begin with four thousand
years ago in the Silk Road and and
we should never get to a point where we
evolve life for the service of mankind
at the risk of these wonderful creatures
um across the kingdoms across the
kingdom of life I don't think about the
same kind of ethical range
um when I think about bacteria
nevertheless bacteria are pretty
wonderful organisms I'm moving to my
second cup here
as things are getting serious now
bacteria are yeah for sure let's give
bacteria all the love they deserve we
wouldn't be here without them they were
here for I don't know what it is like a
billion years before anything else but
in a way if you think about it they
create the matter that we consume and
then
and then we reincarnate or dissolved
into the soil and then creates an a tree
and then that tree creates more bacteria
and then that bacteria could I mean
again again that's why I like to think
about not recycling but reincarnating
because that assumes a kind of imparting
upon nature that dimension of agency and
and maybe awareness but yeah lots of
really interesting work happening with
bacteria
um directed evolution is one of them
we're looking we're looking at directed
Evolution so high throughput directed
evolution of
um of bacteria for the production of
products and again those products can be
a shoe um wearables biomaterials
therapeutical Therapeutics and doing
that direction computationally totally
computationally obviously in in the lab
with with with the hero organism the
hero bacteria
um and and and what's happening today in
in
um equal microbial synthetic biology
synthetic biology that lends itself to
ecology and again all of these fields
are coming together it's such a
wonderful time to be a designer I can
think of a better time to be a designer
in this world
um but with
um High throughput directed Evolution
and I should say that the physical space
in our new lab will have these capsules
which which we have designed
um that are
um that they are designed like growth
Chambers or grow rooms
um and in those Grow rooms we can
basically
um
program
um top-down environmental templating
right top-down environmental control of
Lights humidity light Etc so light
humidity and temperature
um while doing a bottom-up genetic
regulation so it is a wet lab but in
that wet lab you could do at the same
time you know genetic genetic modulation
regulation and and environmental
templating and then again the idea is
that in one of those capsules maybe we
grow transparent wood and in another
capsule we you know we transparent wood
for architectural application another
capsule we grow a shoe and in another
capsule we look at that language you
know large language model that we talked
about and there's a particular
technology associated with that which
we're hoping to reveal to the world in
February
um and in each of those capsules is
basically a high throughput
computational environment like a
breadboard that has think of sort of a
physical breadboard environment that has
access to oxygen and nitrogen and CO2
and nutritional dispensing and these
little capsules could be stressed
they're sort of a an ecology in a box
and they could be stressed to produce
the food of the future or the products
of the future or the construction
materials of the future
um food food is a very interesting one
obviously because of food insecurity and
and and the issues that we have around
both in terms of
food insecurity but also in terms of the
future of food and what what will remain
after we can't eat plants and animals
anymore and all we can eat is these
false bananas and and and and and
um you know and insects as our protein
source so there we're thinking you know
can we design these capsules to stress
an environment and see how that
environment behaves think about a kind
of a an ecological a a biodiversity
chamber right a kind of a time capsule
that is designed as a
biodiversity chamber where you can
program the exact temperature humidity
and light
um combination uh to emulate the
environment from the past so Ohio 1981
December 31st at 5am in the morning what
did tomatoes taste like uh to all the
way in the future 200 years ago these
are the the input the environmental
inputs these are some genetic
regulations that I'm testing and what
might the food of the future or the
products of the future or the
construction materials of the future
um
feel like tests like behave like Etc and
so these capsules are designed as part
of a lab that's why it's been taking us
such a long time to get to this point
um because we started designing them in
2019 and they're currently literally as
I speak to you under construction how
well is it understood how to do this
dance of control in these different
variables in order for various kinds of
growth to happen it's not it's never
been done before and these capsules have
never been designed before so I you know
when when when we first decided these
are going to be environmental capsules
people thought were crazy what are you
building what are you making so the
answer is that we don't know but we know
that there has never been a space like
this where you have basically a wet lab
and a grow room at that resolution
um that granularity uh of of of of of of
control over organisms
there's a reason why there is this
incredible evolution of products in the
software space
um the hardware space that's a more
limiting space that because of the
physical infrastructure that we have to
test and experiment with things so we
really wanted to push on
creating a wet lab that is novel in
every possible way what could you create
in it you could create the future you
could create a a you could create an
environment of plants talking to each
other with a robotic referee and the
robotic referee we you know and you
could you could
set an objective function and let's say
for for for for for the uh
um transaction driven individuals in the
world let's say the objective function
is carbon sequestration and
um and all of those plants are
um
are implemented with a gaming engine and
they have this reward system right and
they're constantly needing to optimize
the way in which they carbon sequest we
read out the bad guys we leave the good
guys and we end up with this like ideal
Ecology of carbon sequestering Heroes
that connect and communicate with each
other and once we have that model this
biodiversity chamber we send it out into
the field
um and we see what happens in nature and
that that's sort of what I'm talking
about
augmenting plants with that extra
dimension of
of bandwidth that they do not have and
they're they're just just last week
um I came across a paper
um that discusses uh the in Vivo neurons
that are that are augmented with a pong
game and uh and in a dish they basically
present sentience and the beginning of
awareness which is which is wonderful
like that that you could actually take
these neurons from a mouse brain and and
you have the electrical circuits and the
physiological circuits that enable uh
these cells to connect and communicate
and together arrive at Sort Of Swarm
situation that allows them to act as a
system that is not only perceived to be
sentient but is actually sentient
um Michael Levine calls this a gentle
material material that has agency right
so so so so this this this is of
interest to us because this is sort of
again this is emergence post templating
you template until you don't need to
template anymore because because the
system has its own rules right what we
don't want to happen with AGI we want to
happen with synthetic biology what we
don't want to happen online and software
with language we want for it to happen
with with bio-based materials because
that will get us closer to growing
things as opposed to assembly and and
mechanically yeah putting them together
with toxic materials and compounds if I
can ask a pothead question for a second
so you mentioned just like the silkworms
the individualists silkworms got uh to
actually learn how to collaborate or
actually to collaborate like in a swarm
like way you're talking about getting
plants to communicate in some
interesting way based on an objective
function is it possible
to have some kind of interface between
another kind of organisms humans and
nature so like a human to have a
conversation with with a plant there
already is you know that when we cut
freshly cut grass I love the smell
but it's a smell of actually it's a
smell of distress that the Leaves of
Grass are communicating to each other so
the grass when it's cut emits green leaf
volatiles glvs and those glvs are
basically one leaf of grass
communicating to another Leaf of grass
be careful mind you you're about to be
cut
these incredible life forms are
communicating using a different language
than ours we use language models they
use molecular models at the moment where
we can parse we can we can decode these
molecular moments is when we can start
having a conversation with plants now of
course there is a lot of work around
Plant neurobiology it's a real thing
plants do not have a nervous system but
they have something akin to a nervous
system it has a kind of a ecological
intelligence that is focused on a
particular time scale and the time scale
is very very slow slow slow time scale
so it is when we can melt these time
scales and and and and connect with
these plants in terms of the content of
the language in this case molecules the
duration of the language and we can
start having a conversation if not
simply to understand what is happening
in the plant kingdom Precision
agriculture I promise to you will look
very very very different right because
right now we're using drones to take
photos of crops of corn that look bad
and when we take that photo it's already
too late but if we understand these
molecular Footprints and things that
they are trying to say the stress that
they are trying to communicate then we
could of course predict the
physiological biolog