V2_ Knowledgebase

Annamaria Weldon is a West Australian poet who also writes and publishes in other genres, and has done since her first feature article appeared in 1978. Working with words in different ways, she’s developed the writing practice which has sustained her for more than thirty years through changes of career, home life and location.

Christa Sommerer& Laurent Mignonneau are two of the most renowned and innovative artists on the international media art and interactive art scene. In a natural and intuitive way, their work develops interactive interfaces that apply principles of the theory of living systems related to ecology, artificial life and the complexity science.

Green WiFi is committed to providing solar powered access to global information and educational resources for developing regions and K-12 school children striving for knowledge in a digitally divided world. There are approximately 3 billion people under the age of 15 living in developing nations. 42 percent of the developing world's population is below the age of 15. Green WiFi was founded on the principle that the welfare of our world is dependent, in large part, on providing these children with free and open access to the world's information.

NCUBATOR Hybrid Laboratory at the Intersection of Art, Science and Ecology is a physical and theoretical hub, a new art/science laboratory at The University of Windsor. Founded in 2009 it functions both as an apparatus in which environmental conditions can be controlled towards the assisted proliferation of life, but also as a site that supports the proliferation of new ideas – new artistic practices. Physically and metaphorically INCUBATOR serves as site for innovative productive and performative imaginings of biotechnology as a technology of the body – a complex ecology – that implicates each of us intellectually and biologically in the continued propagation of the life sciences.

myforestfarm is a carbon offset program in the form of a reforestation project in partnership with Thomas Daquioag and Renato Habulan located in the mountains near Antipolo City, Philippines. We started to develop 17000 sqm of deforested land in June 2008. In the first stage 500 fruit trees were planted. In 2009 more than 1000 forest trees followed. The effectiveness of tree-planting offsets faces controversy, the logic of the carbon credit market questionable. myforestfarm is an experiment to research on these issues with an artistic approach.

Open Energy aims to develop a platform to explore new systems of visualization energy use and to optimize it accordingly, both in domestic and industrial environments. The system is built along two dimensions: first one, Energy Monitoring Device, which investigates open hardware devices in which monitoring power consumption, and a second dimension, Open Energy Visualization (Data Visualization / Augmented Reality App), which explores new ways of real-time visualization power consumption in domestic environments. These systems will allow us to amplify our knowledge about the dynamic behavior of energy anywhere. Open Energy is a prototype of energy infrastructure completely Open Source.

The curtain integrates an efficient organic living carbon sink into an interior space. The curtain produces an amount of oxygen equivalent to a mature broad leaved tree – it is a dramatically enhanced house plant. The curtain is composed of an array of algae bioreactors. A network of indoor air, power and nutrient supply lines weave the bioreactors into a single membrane. The nutrients are supplied by the building’s waste water. The curtain is nourished by the CO2 from the exhalation of the inhabitants. It is directly responsive to the users and the environment; each module operates autonomously and sensors activate select modules as appropriate to the changing levels of CO2 within a space. The modules then expand and contract with circulating air revealing a mechanic-organic organism that is continuously refreshing the air.

The city is a vast and incredibly complex metabolism in which the human species is the tiniest of fractions; tiny and yet intrinsically linked into an organic embroidery beyond our understanding. It is within this complex fabric that (future) biotechnologies will end up. Pigeon d’Or proposes the use of feral pigeons as a platform and interface for synthetic biology in an urban environment by attempting to make a pigeon defecate soap. By modifying the metabolism of pigeons, synthetic biology allows us to add new functionality to what are commonly seen as “flying rats.” A special bacteria has been designed and created that, when fed to pigeons, turns feces into detergent and is as harmless to pigeons as yoghurt is to humans. Through the pursuit of manipulating pigeon excrement and designing appropriate architectural interfaces, the project explores the ethical, political, practical and aesthetic consequences of designing biology.

Despite its quaint reputation, agriculture has always been an early adapter of technology. This is evident from the beginning of mechanization with the cotton gin, McCormick's Reaper, tractors, hybrid seed, to genetically engineered plants that protect themselves and grow in arid environments. Yields have grown quickly, but demand from developing countries and population growth are growing faster We know that we need to continue to find ways to increase the productivity of land on a per unit basis. Agriculture has started to add computerization and automation to the current machinery with things like GPS based precision farming systems that can autonomously drive tractors, monitor yield, and apply fertilizer. However, these aftermarket add-ons are built around the single most expensive and awkward part of the equipment. The person controlling the tractor. Prospero is the working prototype of an Autonomous Micro Planter (AMP) that uses a combination of swarm and game theory.

In Synthetic Biology, the Biobrick has been used as an abstraction or template for creating standardized functional living parts. Searching for UGEM is an alternate re-appropriations of the BioBrick by using existing BioBrick primers as random-PCR(Polymerase Chain Reaction) primers in investigating soil samples. This random PCR will provide a succinct signature of the biological diversity present in these samples. These investigations of soil lead us to ask questions about citizen’s science "performed" by non-institutional actors using accessible tools as well as gives us a glimpse into the "post-natural world" where BioBricks may end up in our environment and may very well show up as bands in a gel. By imagining a world in which the Biobrick has become the accepted standard for synthetic biology, and where these engineered products are ubiquitous in our lives and environments, the samples we archive will serve as the baseline from which the subsequent extent of human influence can be measured. These investigations are carried out in a custom built public research laboratory, the blueprints for making one are available online. These Autonomous Public Laboratories can be used as template for creating a citizen's research lab with which one can carry out "experiments"-biotechnological or otherwise.

The Environmental Health Clinic at NYU is a clinic and lab, modeled on other health clinics at universities. However the project approaches health from an understanding of its dependence on external local environments; rather than on the internal biology and genetic predispositions of an individual. The clinic works like this: you make an appointment, just like you would at a traditional health clinic, to talk about your particular environmental health concerns. What differs is that you walk out with a prescription not for pharmaceuticals but for actions: local data collection and urban interventions directed at understanding and improving your environmental health; plus referrals, not to medical specialists but to specific art, design and participatory projects, local environmental organizations and local government or civil society groups: organizations that can use the data and actions prescribed as legitimate forms of participation to promote social change.