Collection by Melissa Abel
Technology
Current Window - MARJAN VAN AUBEL
Current Window is a modern version of stained glass — using current technologies. The coloured pieces of glass are generating electricity from daylight, and can even harness diffused sunlight. This electricity can be used to power a whole range of electrical appliances. The glass pieces are made of ‘Dye Sensitised Solar Cells’, which use the properties of colour to create an electrical current — just like photosynthesis in plants. Similarly to the various shades of green chlorophyll absorbing light, the coloured window panes harness energy.
Plug in your devices through integrated USB ports in the window ledge. The greater the surface exposed, the more energy will be collected. Imagine these windows in churches, schools, and workplaces! Current Window offers us an example of energy-harvesting in a natural and aesthetic way, for our future.
ARUP's SoundLab creates virtual sonic environments to help architects improve the acoustics of their buildings. What it really does, though, is transport you visually and aurally into any space—a concert hall, a subway platform, a cathedral. It’s one thing to make it look like you’re there; VR is good at that.Using acoustic simulation software, the engineers pass that audio signal through the virtual room’s acoustic signature, simulating how it would sound anywhere in that space.
The Punkt. MP 01 Mobile Phone #Backtothebasics
Eindhoven’s Massoud Hassani of Hassani Design BV emulated natural "technology" with his Mine Kafon, a low-tech landmine detector that is powered by gravity and wind energy. It contains a GPS chip to precisely transmit the location of mines it has detected or detonated. The 175-pound prototype is heavy enough to trip land mines while rolling across the ground or down hills in the outskirts of, say, Kabul, Afghanistan, where Hassani used to play as a child with homemade wind-powered toys alongside his younger brother.