Rachel Armstrong

On Creativity of Slime Mould

Slime mould Physarum polycephalum is large single cell with intriguingly smart behaviour. The slime mould shows outstanding abilities to adapt its protoplasmic network to varying environmental conditions. The slime mould can solve tasks of computational geometry, image processing, logics and arithmetics when data are represented by configurations of attractants and repellents. We attempt to map behavioural patterns of slime onto the cognitive control vs. schizotypy spectrum phase space and thus interpret slime mould’s activity in terms of creativity.

Designing with protocells: applications of a novel technical platform.

The paper offers a design perspective on protocell applications and presents original research that characterizes the life-like qualities of the Bütschli dynamic droplet system, as a particular “species” of protocell. Specific focus is given to the possibility of protocell species becoming a technical platform for designing and engineering life-like solutions to address design challenges. An alternative framing of the protocell, based on process philosophy, sheds light on its capabilities as a technology that can deal with probability and whose ontology is consistent with complexity, nonlinear dynamics and the flow of energy and matter. However, the proposed technical systems do not yet formally exist as products or mature technologies. Their potential applications are therefore experimentally examined within a design context as architectural “projects”—an established way of considering proposals that have not yet been realized, like an extended hypothesis. Exemplary design-led projects are introduced, such as The Hylozoic Ground and Future Venice, which aim to “discover”, rather than “solve”, challenges to examine a set of possibilities that have not yet been resolved. The value of such exploration in design practice is in opening up a set of potential directions for further assessment before complex challenges are procedurally implemented.

How do the origins of life sciences influence 21st century design thinking

How can the origins of life sciences inform design thinking in an ecological era? This paper considers the possibility of the origins of life sciences as being more than a blue sky practice for the development of advanced scientific theories but also offers a technical platform for designing and engineering life-like solutions for an ecological era. A design-led study of dissipative systems is discussed as a form of natural computing and innovation platform that can deal with probability and whose ontology (nature of becoming) is consistent with complexity, nonlinear dynamics and the flow of energy and matter. However, since the proposed approaches do not yet formally exist as products or mature technologies, exemplary design-led projects are introduced to explore the principles of design and engineering with these origins of life strategies. A portfolio of work is presented that includes the The Hylozoic Ground installation and Future Venice projects. Such experimental work investigates the value of collaborations between the origins of sciences and design practice as a strategic approach towards new systems such as, artificial soils ‐ which may not only be recognised as applied research fields that offer insights into the transition from inert to living matter ‐ but also give rise to potential cultural impacts and commercial opportunities in the built environment.

Experimental Architecture and Unconventional Computing

This chapter examines aspects of unconventional computing from a design perspective through the practice of architecture. It reflects on how non-scientific forms of investigation may help develop cultural and economic frameworks for design thinking and scientific innovation, by building public and commercial interest in the field.

Embodied intelligence: changing expectations in building performance

This article proposes a theory and practice of embodied intelligence in the built environment that has been precipitated by an age of advanced biotechnological developments, which enable us to design and engineer with living systems. The idea of ‘intelligence’ used in this article is not based on a human understanding of the concept but rather as a distributed, responsive material not dissimilar to primitive cellular organisms such as slime moulds. Yet designing and engineering with living systems as responsive matter whose embodied ‘intelligence’ is distributed and networked – rather than central and hierarchical – is a very different kind of undertaking to working with machines. By taking an experimental approach, my work aims to explore emerging ‘natural computing’ approaches to assist with thinking about the performance of lively materials capable of primitive decision-making operations, which may be of value to design practices such as Bio Design. Notably, embodied intelligence may offer a different way of understanding the issue of sustainability in the built environment in which the longevity of material integrity – and therefore reduction in building maintenance – may be enhanced by simple ‘decisions’. Rather than evaluating building performance through industrial definitions, which looks to material and energy conservation, embodied intelligence engages the capacity of our buildings to support the processes of life and so, increases the fertility of our homes and cities.

Interstellar research methodologies

If our understanding of life and human potentiality evolved over millennia in relation to a largely hospitable environment, how do we set about planning for life in conditions of unrelenting hostility? What is our relationship to an alien space? Is it a space of human projection or do we make our living systems, values, technologies, and dependencies responsive according to whatever we encounter out in the unknown? If so, how do we create the conditions for a malleable, terrestrial orphan—an indefinitely nomadic ecosystem?

Architecture and space exploration

This chapter proposes that the production of different kinds of architecture will be key to how we explore, inhabit, and ultimately colonize space.

An ecological approach to interstellar exploration

This chapter proposes that a new understanding of “sustainability” will enable us to inhabit extreme environments and spaces that cannot be bridged in a single natural human lifetime.

Building a worldship interior

This chapter proposes an approach towards constructing new worlds beginning with life-bearing soils.

Experimental architecture: on-world and off-world exploration of possibilities

This chapter explores ways of dealing with very complex and ambitious research questions using iterative experiments and innovative laboratory settings whose explorations produce probabilistic outcomes.