Incredibly natural and even synthetic materials can move – like magic – and create a new shape such as roses or curled fingers for themselves if they are exposed to light, cold, heat, air humidity or other forces without manual assembly, engines, shapes or applied pressure.
These fascinating effects are exhibited at a special exhibition in the Bloomfield Science Museum in Jerusalem, which is open until the end of May.
“Automorphia”-“Auto” means “itself” and “Morph” and refers to the gradual change from one thing to the other-shows the forms inspired by nature and how materials can be transformed without use external forces, and paving the way for sustainable design and innovation.
It can be inspired by nature how the way plants are reduced as a reaction to air humidity (hygroscopic movement) or how proteins are reduced into complicated forms. The materials use internal properties such as differential expansion, programmed stress or chemical reactions to redesign themselves.
The seed pod contains uneven growth over the thickness. When it is young and damp, the two sides of the pod are flat and fit together and thus protect the young seeds. Each pod consists of two fibrous layers in vertical layers that shrink when dry. The result is a curvature that means that it turns into opposite directions and shoots the seeds around them.
The exhibition enables visitors to find out how these principles can revolutionize engineering, architecture and industry, which leads to more efficient and sustainable design solutions. They can be used in industrial materials, architectural design and beyond plant-inspired hygroscopic structures that react to moisture, right up to advanced self-morphic ceramics and composite materials and an insight into a future in which material science is inspired directly from their own innovations of nature.
By reducing material waste and energy consumption, suicide materials offer a transformative alternative to traditional production and shows how science can imitate nature in order to create smarter and more adaptive technologies. It could even be used to produce better materials for the covering of buildings.
It was a joint effort of the groundbreaking research of the Racah Institute of Physics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, led by Prof. Eran Sharon, with Arielle Blonder from Technion – Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa. The exhibition is supported by Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Foundation and the Jerusalem Foundation.
“This exhibition illuminates how natural self-education processes manage design and engineering and offers a more efficient and sustainable approach to creating materials and structures,” said Rony Ben-Chaim, director of the museum, at the opening ceremony, in which over 100 invited guests took part. “We are happy to work with Prof. Eran Sharon's laboratory at the Hebrew University to bring this vision to life.”
Sharon, who co -founded the Automorphia Research Group with Blonder, said: “Industrial manufacturing processes treat solid materials as static and passive units that are shaped by external forces. As a result, many of these processes are inefficient, wasteful and generate excessive material waste. In contrast, nature shows that materials can be active participants in design through growth.
“If we can use it ourselves to apply industrial and architectural materials, we can create more efficient, sustainable and dynamic products with natural properties. We have decided to present these technologies through a variety of exhibits to present-old, technically oriented, some artistic or designs to present their versatility and potential applications. “
A blue, green and white structure shows that flat polylactic acid or polylactide (PLA) turn leaves into 3D forms when they get into hot water, a result of its internally printed structure.
PLA is a thermoplastic from renewable resources. It can be made from cornstarch, tapioka roots or sugar cane. It is often used in the food and beverage industry to wrap environmentally sensitive foods. At the opening of the exhibition, each participant was handed over a small PLA leaf because he had tried it.
Mayor Moshe Lion and President of the Hebrew University, Prof. Asher Cohen, welcomed the cooperation between the museum, the university and the community. she said