JONO_COATES

technology_DNA

30 years is a long time where a lot of change can happen. Our climate is not just the only thing that is drastically changing. Technology is advancing at an exponential rate. One exciting aspect amongst this progressing technology is DNA.

All Living things have DNA. All living things are made up of Cells. Each Cell is a factory that performs functions vital for life. A cell is constructed of building blocks called protein molecules. They produce energy and transport nutrients. Amino acids are assembled to make up a protein, arrangement of these Amino acids determine a proteins shape and function. This operating system of assembling functions or instructions is called DNA.

DNA is made up of a string of bases and can be read as a ‘code’.  The sequence of these bases determines a cells ‘code’.

With emerging digital technologies it is beginning to make it possible to arrange a cells ‘code’ and essentially direct its functions or instructions.

Simultaneously as this digital technology advances a new breed of designers will emerge, DNA Designers.

These designers will have the ability to program the exact code of a cell, ‘designing’ its functions such as how it grows, how it reproduces, how it utilises energy and even how it processes and produces useful compounds like water and oxygen.

With this type of technology there is potential to produce designed living things such as living products and architecture.

These types of ‘living’ products and architecture will open up a new element to design. Designs will grow, evolve and change over time, adapt to their surroundings and even create their own habitat.

 

As the sea level rises, water will start to become a part of the city of Wellington. This would be the perfect habitat where these types of products and architecture could exist.

By Wellington’s architecture becoming ‘living’, a completely sustainable city will emerge where buildings would be self sufficient, able to use the resources around them to survive and supply their surroundings with their own resources.

Wellington will become an evolving city.

One example of how the buildings could utilise the rising sea level could be through water pollination to reproduce. This is where a building disperses its DNA to connect with another buildings DNA to form new DNA or ‘new architecture’.