Cyano-Chromic Interface: Aligning Human-Microbe Temporalities Towards Noticing and Attending to Living Artefacts

Microbes offer designers opportunities to endow artefacts with environmental sensing and adapting abilities, and unique expressions. However, microbe-embedded artefacts present a challenge of temporal dissonance, reflected by a “time lag” typically experienced by humans in noticing the gradual and minute shifts in microbial metabolism. This...

The vanishing link between animalcules and disease before the 19th century

When Antoni van Leeuwenhoek began his work with microscopes in the late 17th century, western medicine was mostly based on the work of a Roman doctor called Galen (129-199 ad), theological interpretation, superstition, and folk remedies. During modern discussions of Van Leeuwenhoek's work, a common question from listeners is why it took so...

Designing living artefacts: Opportunities and challenges for biodesign

Biodesign is an emerging form of design practice integrating biological materials and processes, and there is a growing interest in the field for structured conversations to generate insights on how it can be best taught, researched, and disseminated. In our conversations, we began exploring biodesign under the framework of Living Artefacts, in...