This clever Tyvek wallet by Dynomighty Design in New York looks like an airmail envelope. I do wish it actually were made of old airmail envelopes. What would a FedEx wallet look like?
Related Posts: Plastic Bag Wallet, MAU Tyvek Clothing, American Apparel Tyvek Jacket
Popularity: 7% [?]
A group of microbiologists from University of Birmingham have discovered that feeding Escherichia coli (e. coli) sugary chocolate-factory biproducts causes the bacteria to excrete hydrogen which can then be turned into a more sustainable form of electricity; enough to power the fuel cell of a small electric fan. They are now also experimenting with having the bacteria recover palladium and other precious metals from the catalytic converters of old cars to increase recycleability. Certainly shocking.
Links: News Article, Journal Article
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Popularity: 4% [?]
The NY Times 2, Wired and Slashdot are a-buzz. The new Tesla Motors all-electric sports car has been unveiled and it’s hott. You might recognize some styling from the UK car-maker Lotus (the front turn signal was the giveaway), but don’t be mistaken, this baby’s all-electric and powered by some amazing engineering by some buddies of mine who’ve got it tight. It’s more than twice as efficient as the best hybrid-electric (internal combustion engine-based) vehicle on the road today and it’s an improvement on urban air quality. Some say it’s just diverting oil to coal (for electricity), but at least there’s carbon sequestration options there… and in the future, there’s sure to be more affordable renewable electricity on the way... See the new Tesla roadster for yourself!
Related Posts: Tesla Motors Unveiled
Popularity: 6% [?]
In the mid 1980s, architect Renzo Piano developed this beautiful modular pavilion for the display of IBM products. It was set up in various cities across Europe (Lyons, London, York, Rome, Milan) to the backdrop of famous architectural sites.
The structure is of particular interest structurally, as it is composed of three main repeating elements: a cast aluminum joint, a short laminated wooden beam, and a clear polycarbonate pyramid. The pyramids nest for efficient transportation – but more amazingly, they play the role of cross-braces in a truss, both laterally and axially. Apparently Piano brought one to a meeting with IBM in Paris, and to assuage their doubts about the structure’s strength, hit one as hard as he could with a sledgehammer. Despite the noise, it was unharmed, and IBM approved the project that day.
I imagine that with such standardized pieces, along with the fact that the structure requires no heavy machinery to assemble, the IBM pavilion might have been a good prototype for developing-world housing. Maybe with some tinted plastic for privacy.
Related Posts: Shipping Container Refugee Housing, Curtain House, Vasariano Corridoio
Popularity: 12% [?]
The Canary Project has an amazing and sobering collection of photographs depicting ecological destruction worldwide. Above are dead corals in Belize’s Barrier Reef. I was also amazed by these photos showing a glacier partially wrapped in insulating “blankets” by an Austrian ski resort.
The mission of The Canary Project is to photograph landscapes around the world that are exhibiting dramatic transformation due to global warming and to use these photographs to persuade as many people as possible that global warming is already underway and of immediate concern.
Related Posts: Art of Scientific Photography, Environmental Photographer Burtynsky, High Speed Imaging
Popularity: 12% [?]
According to an episode of Animal Planet’s Most Extreme, a special type of ant found in Brunei and Malaysia actually uses its glands to explode itself when the colony is threatened, spraying toxic chemicals over its enemies. (Talk about kamikaze!) Apparently you can produce a similar effect by feeding regular ants corn meal or grits with water.
Links via Journal of Chemical Ecology, Wikipedia
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We’ve been experimenting with using glassblowing techniques on plastic bottles – without much success so far. Our intent is to invent a means of creating a “New World Bottle” (see previous post on Heineken’s World Bottle) from reused plastic water bottles, which are very abundant here in Lima, due to unsafe tap water, and which are not recycled here. These bottles, if remolded into blocks, and filled with sand, could be a DIY alternative to clay bricks, which cost between 10 and 40 cents each – for a total house price (10’ x 10’ x 8’ high) of $100-$400 for bricks alone. Granted, the margins we’re working in may not make it cheaper to use bottles, but we’d like to give it a try.
The benefit of this is that given the availability of plastic bottles, cheap labor, and sand (many of the slums around Lima are built on sand), people may be able to create the building materials for their own homes.
The problem so far is twofold: heating the bottles evenly is hard to achieve, even while spinning the bottles over a flame, as glassblowers do – and PET plastic shrinks when exposed to heat, so it’s very difficult to “inflate” the heated bottles once they’re soft. So far all we’ve made are the above “miniaturized” bottles. Next we’re going to try sealing the bottles before heating them, so they’ll remain the same volume. We are also trying to maintain better heating, so we may move to some kind of insulated box instead of just the kitchen burner. Maybe a basic brick oven? But costs then begin to rise.
I wonder what a house made of reformed, sand-filled plastic bottles would look like?
Related Posts: Lima Slums, Heineken Beer Bottle Bricks
Also see our Flickr Pool
Popularity: 26% [?]
Along the lines of our Book Bar, this 1950s design for stackable beer bottles was the brainchild of Alfred Heineken, of beer fame.
As the story goes, Heineken was strolling along by the sea in Jamaica, and was shocked at the number of beer bottles littering the beach. He was also concerned with the lack of cheap building materials, and at the resulting living conditions for the poor. Putting two and two together, he envisioned a “World Bottle” which would be imported for drinking but kept for construction.
A 10’ x 10’ shack would take approximately 1000 bottles to build, but the Jamaican tourist industry would likely supply plenty. In addition, glass (and air) are good insulators, though the humid and hot Jamaican climate may not require insulation per se. A unique feature was that the short bottle neck would fit into a depression in the bottom of each bottle. Ultimately though, the idea was either (according to different accounts) voted down by the Heineken board, or vetoed by the bottle companies and the customers. Not much information is available on the World Bottle today, but there have been other attempts to make interlocking “bottle bricks”, even of plastic.
Link to an article on Heineken (the man, not the beer) at the BBC website.
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There will always be a warm spot in my heart for nerdy songs with creative lyrics. That’s why, when a co-worker introduced me to internet-famous artist, Jonathan Coulton, the other day, I couldn’t help but share.
From songs like the 3rd-person narrated Code Monkey and writing-home-from-camp / robot-overrun apocolypse Chiron Beta Prime, to songs dedicated to famous mathematicians and bioengineering (just to mention a few : ), how can you resist!? The best part is that Coulton distributes his songs under a Creative Commons license, so you can download his stuff guilt-free.
Link to more songs
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Popularity: 3% [?]
Though if brought to America, the Chairbag would probably be slapped with a “product not for use as a personal floatation device” warning label, I would welcome this inflatable, water resistant sitting device during any flood or abandonment at sea. Inspired by buoys and rising sea levels, the Chairbag is the first product of Amsterdam based PS Lab ( http://www.pslab.nl/) and is advertised as a lightweight, soda-resisting, outdoor and indoor beanbag chair alternative. Available in several colors but only one scent: vanilla.
Popularity: 3% [?]
