Friday, November 21, 2008
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Advanced simulation in design
Engineering simulation
Using simulation techniques in emergent technologies and design is not limited to using engineering software, but also includes the use of animation software familiar to a wider design community (Maya), and the scripting capabilities and solvers on offer for developing custom simulation tools.
Engineering simulations in fields other than architecture are well developed, and suggest new directions for research within architecture and engineering.
Urban Simulations
Cities are complex systems. The flow of vehicles and people within a city represents the emergent behavior of such a system, produced by the large numbers of decisions of the individuals, and their interaction with each other and with the transport infrastructure of the city. Complex systems are, by definition, nonlinear and sensitive to initial conditions, so that small changes in such conditions may produce turbulent behavior at the global scale.
Manufacturing, Construction and Material Simulations
As architects become more accustomed to working directly with construction manufacturers at the inception of a design, the potential benefits of integrating manufacturing processes into the design generation will become more evident and more widely adopted.
Conclusion
Working with simulations requires the development of a logical mathematical description of the performance of a system or process, which corresponds to certain specific parameters of its physical behavior. In the sciences, ‘model’ means more than the geometrical description of an object that we commonly use this term for. A model is an abstraction of a process, and can be refined as understanding of a process develops, so that complex problems can be accurately modeled. Simulations are essential for designing complex material systems, and for analyzing their behavior over extended periods of time.
Example:
http://broadartfoundation.org/bcam/overview.html 
Photo: arcspace
image courtesy of the ARUP2008/05: Architectural Record ; p.240
the analysis account light passing through the shylight from the north and light reflected between the inclined sunshades.
Renzo Piano Building WorkshopBCAMLos Angeles, California
Source: 2008/05: Architectural Record ; p.238-240;
Michael Weinstock, Nikolaos Stathopoulos
2006: “Advanced simulation in design” AD 76/2 = 180; p.54-59.
Summarized by: Xinyu SHI
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Kunststoffe, frei Formen und Nachhaltigkeit
Anmerkungen zum Ressourcenmanagement nach dem MIPS-Konzept
The development of the society and of the economy brings us to use more and more natural ressources.
This ressources are used because of the human need of satisfaction.
Each central european uses in one year about 80 ton of natural ressources.
www.flickr.com/.../
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUTz_FM4i3Vc_CttEMxtfQWLJIyHW9EPrDoLRHiwYTidpxM-n7deO-mzZ42vXgVFkXauIuLroSMNLXoWMJnMlhnUJnlyQ5zefSUMv7QG-VqKq_Jxsn_WQnwlpYgrFaFy85D9iWAYTzuU_8/s1600-h/2uikrjl.jpg
www.old.ciutacu.ro/
MIPS- concept
MiPS(Material Intensity Pro Serviceeinheit)
Mips institute was established in 2004. In the centre of their concept
is the Enviroment, they try to use more forceful wastages of the primary production of the
raw materials till the Recyceln and Downcyceln.
The question is what exactly is sustainable development and does synthetic materials
have a part to the sustainability as it develope further?
Sustainable developments are used more like an image and selfsatisfying atribut, so it is
very often missused. The natural building materials like wood and stones are not necessary sustainablematerials, and the synthetic materials like aluminium and other plastics are not really in an ecological way made.
In the need for the occorence of sustainability humans have to lear how to
harness their existing resoursses and refrain from borrowing from the planet.
Self-Organisation and the Structural Dynamics of Plants
George Jerronimidis and Nikolaos Strathopoulos (both from Emtech, AA) explored the integrated morphologies of plants. In their studies they have discovered some links between the plants growing behavior and possible human made structures. The abstractisation of principles from nature for use in engineering is called biomimetics.
As a starting point they had the fact that evolution develops optimized, efficient strong structures. The general behavior of plants is complex and adaptive, through the different behaviors they have for dealing with gravitation and wind loads (such as different stem sections).
In nowadays engineering, redundancy is the opposite to efficiency. But redundancy is the primary evolutionary strategy (species which are not designed to survive just one environmental behavior, survive longer).
Based on a stochastic process, robust system that can persist through time are being created. Stochastic is the opposite to deterministic, which is a process that creates the same output from a given starting condition. Through the fact that the stochastic process never creates the same output it will preclude the standardization of components and members in architecture, design and engineering.
Generic patterns like triangle, polygon and spiral appear at a closer look. The main principle of bio self-organization is the fact that small, simple components arrange themselves in 3d patterns to form larger organizations, which themselves rearrange in larger structures. The system within system works as an hierarchical arrangement of semi-autonomous organization.
For analyzing these structures 3D models (with use of numerical methods and finite element approach, FEA) have been used in order to test the growth under stress. Another used method was the associative modeling software (Generative Components Software) from Bentley Systems.
Two of the plant structures they have analyzed were the ones of bamboo and palms. The discoveries they made were that the bamboo negotiates stress more efficiently than manmade structures with a minimum of materials and that the palm leafs are perfectly built to resist dynamic forces, through the fact that they deal with resonance through torsional stiffness. The bending energy is transformed into twisting energy.
The conclusion about redundancy and differentiation is that structural dynamics of all natural systems are complex and adaptive. The mechanical joint in engineered structures needs to be rethought and, if possible, eliminated. Anisotropy, a graduation of values between stiffness and elasticity along the length of the stem is useful for resisting dynamic unpredictable loadings.
Waterpavilion Beijing 2005
http://www.chrisbosse.de/projects/waterpavilion/web/h2.htm
Waterpavilion Beijing 2005
Chris Bosse - PTW Architects
http://www.chrisbosse.de/projects/waterpavilion/web/h8.htm
Waterpavilion Beijing 2005
Chris Bosse - PTW Architects
http://www.chrisbosse.de/projects/waterpavilion/web/h3.htm
Waterpavilion Beijing 2005
Chris Bosse - PTW Architects
http://www.chrisbosse.de/projects/waterpavilion/web/h1.htm
Waterpavilion Beijing 2005
Chris Bosse - PTW Architects
General Links:
Excerpt from:
WEINSTOCK, Michael
2006: “Self-Organisation and the Structural Dynamics” AD 76/2 = 180; p.26-33.
Summarized by: Tudor Cosmatu.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Environmentally Sensitive
Growth Modeling
Biological processes and computation:
The nature is the master of all designs; it is wise, and perfectly tuned as a perfect functional and complex machine. In some aspects how it works is a difficult puzzle to solve, but, people like Professor Premyslaw Prusinkiewcz, from the University of Calgary, Canada, try to reveal to the world the self-organization processes behind the grow of all living things; Each one perfectly calibrated and adapted to an specific environmental context. Those processes can be observed from the diminute cells, to the social organization of insects, how the plants grow, and much more. But what is Self organization? The answer to this question sounds easy, but it isn´t:
“Self-organization is a process of attraction and repulsion in which the internal organization of a system, normally an open system, increases in complexity without being guided or managed by an outside source”.
The easiest example to illustrate this definition can be found in the embryology, in other words, how an organic system is grows and develops (and all in-between processes like cellular differentiation and morphogenesis), from the zygote to a child.
With the will of translate this concepts from the nature to the virtual world, Biologists and computational scientists worked together to create a software capable of generate and evolve plants, that grow digitally, reacting to environmental stimules. That means each little change on the input affect the development of the model. Moreover, it’s worth to say that the configurations are almost infinite. All this observations are valuable, because they can lead to an architectural strategies created by specific environmental conditions, that possesses advances levels of functionality and performativity.
The ideas of Lindenmayer, applied to computational simulation (programmed by the Calgary team), has opened a big field of possibilities, in terms of modeling and simulation experiment, allowing the manipulation in a easy way of the variables that permits the creation of a large variety of plants at the architectural level. This can be used in architecture to see how buildings structures and envelopes react, in order to be optimized to satisfy established objectives. In words of Professor Prusinkiewicz, the virtual models show (synthetically) the interplay between various aspects of development, and it´s mechanisms, in a clear way. The result of these simulations can be translated into a revolutionary sensibility to design, as they facilitate the understanding of its relationship with the environment.
Stepping into the realm of biomechanics, the simulation can be taken far beyond, by adding physical, biological and environmental input, like gravity or tropism. One good example is the recreation of the orientation of the leaves, towards to the sunlight; this can lead to the design of photovoltaic membranes for example.
In terms of mimicry, looking how the plants manage to deal with smalls resources like thorns, hairs, against extreme conditions dictated by the environment, the architects can adapt this features to their projects to achieve the performance observed in nature.
All this natural aspects can be translated to a computer generated model, to experiment with them, and get results to that can be applied in Architecture.
But this software goes even more further, for example in terms of ecology (the interactions between organisms and their natural environment) it is capable of study the ecological behavior of an individual or a group of organisms, how they are affected by (and how they can affect) their surroundings. This ecological behavior is divided in 3 levels:
1) Stimulus: an external agent that creates a change in an organism
2) Sensibility: the capacity to perceive the stimulus
3) Sensitivity: the response to the stimulus.
When the case of study is a population of organisms, the Calgary team developed simulation tools that can create spatial distributions for plants communities, they are very complex, because each individual has its own and particular features, related to its position in that ecosystem. That is possible by the use of two base models combined in a bidirectional one that is divided in two levels
1) Higher level: it determines the plat distribution
2) Lower level: determines plants shapes and features
This last feature in the Calgary software can leave the field of ecology, and be used in architecture to determine the appropriate distribution of buildings in a determined area, and how each one will react on its emplacement. In resume, this Simulation program works in at 2 scales:
1) Micro (how the organism grows)
2) Macro (how the organism interact with the environment)
All this simulations and experiments can provide the designers with multi performance systems that are optimized that can be used to develop intelligent projects capable of interact and coexist in peace with the nature.
Company: Phillips
Source Link: http://www.design.philips.com/probes/downloads/url_prefix/shared/assets/design/probes/sustainable_water.page
Company: Phillips
Source Link: http://www.design.philips.com/shared/assets/design/probes/sustainable_light.jpg
Sustainable Habitat 2020 (video)