LiveCycles

IAAC Advanced Architecture Group’s installation LiveCycles is a bio-artificial system which responds to the current challenges, interacting with marine ecosystem through the definition of possible marine material cycles, and proposing a mechanism of plastic extraction, recycling and reuse by the means of nano agent systems. The project questioned how small robotic agents can become a new transitional system from built to unbuilt environments and which, in symbiosis with the natural species of the Baltic sea, could act on site, creating interaction between natural and artificial systems.

The installation works with Baltic Sea water, firstly extracting the contained micro-plastics from the marine environment and then, passing through the complex digestion system of nano robot, bio aggregating its particles into a material which can be reused for the further proliferation of this same marine environment.

The installation is a scaled up prototype of the proposed system. In the first of a series of chambers, the polluted sea water is filtered of microplastics, which then move on to stir into a mix of hot water and agar agar. The hot water is boiled and deposited into the mixing vessel by a designated chamber, and the jellifying agar agar powder is added likewise. After a predetermined time of stirring and cooling the mix of trapped microplastics is poured into an extrusion chamber where the material can be extruded. The chambers meanwhile refill with water to the right level detected by sensors, as the system prepares for another cycle.

The control of the system is managed by an Arduino, regulating pneumatic valves, relays and sequence timings of the system cycle.