Field trip to Patagonia with the aim to prototype a biofabrication line in Puerto Williams. Organized joint to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile.
Year: 2019
Role: Researcher, organizer.
Team: Paloma González (Researcher), Alejandro Weiss (Researcher), María José Besoaín (Researcher), Adriana Cabrera (Researcher), Carolina Pacheco (Researcher), Kyle Branchesi (Researcher), Darle Shinsato (Researcher).
Providing access to digital fabrication materials is expected to increase accessibility to digital fabrication and to democratize production methods. Circular economies and distributed autonomous production systems associated with natural resources. Currently, there are several possible materials to introduce to the digital fabrication workflow that are possible to produce outside industrial facilities. Such materials could enable better access to fabrication for the global south. However, a systematization for the development of open source materials with the goal of using them in digital fabrication has not been developed yet. We propose to systematize the open source non industrial process of producing fabrication material from seaweed, fungi and other sources. We will evaluate available material sources from the south of Chile. In addition, we will propose possible applications from this material systems. The main focus of the research field trip is on the systematization, documentation, replicability and applications of generating biopolymers and biocomposites from raw material sources in fablabs.
