2020(S08) Lecture:week 4: Difference between revisions

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===Lego™phoresis===
===Lego™phoresis===
==For next time==
==For next time==
You can find the term "biohacking" increasingly tossed into conversations and presentations. There are examples ranging from [http://biohackery.com/taxonomy/term/3 "how to" websites] to an [http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/comm-vestspeech-0608.html MIT commencement address.] Based on your backyard biology experience today, what do you think of the present and future possibilites of biohacking? As a point of comparison consider the [http://www.builderau.com.au/blogs/byteclub/viewblogpost.htm?p=339270810 hacking of the iPhone]. Here are some questions you might consider as you think about this topic:
*Who can hack computers and who can hack biology?
*Are there speed, safety, and training considerations?
*Do you expect to see garage biotechnologists in your lifetime? Do they already exist? Should they?
Write your ideas, examples and opinions and add them to the homework drop box that's [https://stellar.mit.edu/S/course/20/sp08/20.020/homework/index.html?toolset=hidden here]<br>

Revision as of 06:42, 10 February 2008

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Week 4 Tuesday

Challenge: Superman vs Batman

Instructions: If you're looking to start a fight on a playground, ask a few of the elementary school kids would win if Superman fought Batman. It would be a close fight, for sure, but there's little agreement about which character would remain after a head to head battle. At your tables you should decide the winner and what powers and properties of that character tipped the balance for your group. Start by considering each hero's

  • mobility
  • fighting abilities
  • fighting style
  • major losses and
  • vulnerabilities.
    You might want to list the strengths and weaknesses of each character or you might want to read up on the histories of the heroes and their battles. After 20 minutes we will reconvene as a class to list the attributes that each table has considered and to tally the Superman vs Batman votes. May the best superhero win.

Follow-up: History of flight. Our conversation in class will consider man-made and natural flight.

  1. birds inform swarmbots or birds inform plane designers
  2. robotic fly
  3. 777 wing load test
  4. flying dude
  5. Kitty Hawk, NC 100 years later

Before leaving lecture today, complete your response log entry. In your response, you should note:

  • what the activity was
  • why you think it might have been included in this class
  • if the activity helped you think about:
    • ways to make biology easier to engineer
    • consequences of successfully engineering biology
    • clever ways nature solves physical challenges
    • ways nature innovates
  • if the activity has given you any new tools/considerations that could be useful for your project.

Upload these responses to the lecture response log in the homework dropbox that's here

For next time

Spend 20 minutes watching Janine Benyus present "12 sustainable design ideas from nature." You'll notice that she is not lobbying for biology that to do our bidding, but rather for our technology developers to learn more from nature's ingenious solutions. You'll also notice that she doesn't actually get through 12 ideas but here is a partial list of natural adaptations that designers might mimic:

  1. Self-assembly, e.g. the work of Jeff Brinker and that at the Sandia Nat'l Labs
  2. Biomineralization, e.g. the work of Joanna Aizenberg at Lucent
  3. CO2 as feedstock, e.g. the work of Geoff Coates at Cornell
  4. Solar transformations, e.g. using purple bacteria as they do at ASU
  5. The power of shape, e.g. the whale's fin as studied by Frank Fish
  6. Water harvesting, e.g. the way the Stenocara beetle does, as described by the Biomimicry Guild
  7. Separation techniques, e.g. metals without mining at MR3
  8. Green chemistry, e.g. as described in the Presidential Green Chemistry Challenge
  9. Timed degradation, e.g. as applied to vaccine stability

After watching the video, consider which kind of natural adaptation is the most interesting to you and follow the associated link to read more about it. Then spend 20 minutes writing an email job request to a person associated with that effort. In your email you should introduce yourself, talk about your MIT education and if/how it has helped you explore this area of interest, say what precisely intrigues you about this approach and what you are asking for (e.g. a summer job/a phone conversation/a newspaper interview/a preprint of an article...). Upload your email to the homework drop box that's here
Total time to spend on this assignment <1 hour.

Week 4 Studio

Nip and Tuck

Team's Facebook page here

Part 2:

For next time

Week 4 Thursday

Challenge: Backyard Biology

Cookin' up some DNA in your kitchen

  1. Pour ~20 ml of water into a small white cup
  2. Add 1/4 tsp wheat germ and mix with a coffee stirrer for 3 minutes
  3. Add one glop of liquid soap and mix a little bit every 1 minute for 5 minutes
  4. Add 1/4 tsp meat tenderizer and mix
  5. Add 1/2 tsp baking soda and mix
  6. Allow the slurry to settle and pour some of the top liquid into a clear cup
  7. Dribble some rubbing alcohol down the side of the cup so it sits on top but does not mix with the wheat germ cocktail
  8. Watch what happens at the interface between the wheat germ cocktail and the rubbing alcohol
  9. Try to scoop out some of the goop with a paper clip hook

Lego™phoresis

For next time

You can find the term "biohacking" increasingly tossed into conversations and presentations. There are examples ranging from "how to" websites to an MIT commencement address. Based on your backyard biology experience today, what do you think of the present and future possibilites of biohacking? As a point of comparison consider the hacking of the iPhone. Here are some questions you might consider as you think about this topic:

  • Who can hack computers and who can hack biology?
  • Are there speed, safety, and training considerations?
  • Do you expect to see garage biotechnologists in your lifetime? Do they already exist? Should they?

Write your ideas, examples and opinions and add them to the homework drop box that's here

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