Page 51 - JCAU-5-1

Journal of Chinese
Architecture and Urbanism Microbial technologies: Toward a regenerative architecture

Figure 5. Technical diagram showing the positioning of microbial fuel cells (blue units) within the Living Architecture building system. The system shows
greywater being collected in a settlement tank as feedstock, which then feeds a system of photobioreactors (green) and combined bioreactor units (red/
green/blue) or “bricks” that are separated by membranes that allow the selective passage of substances between them. Waste streams contain cleaned water
and organic sediments that contain a range of biologically valuable compounds like fertilizer. The smaller system on the right incorporates genetically
modified organisms into the array that can program metabolic performance such as the detoxification of nitrous gasses and the reclamation of phosphate
from household detergents. Source: Courtesy of the Living Architecture project, 2019.

through rituals of cleaning, feeding, and care in exchange Electrical activity from the biofilms provided a source for
for a range of services from cleaning wastewater to both power and data, generating ~200 mW/L urine (for 20 L
generating power for the installation. Emphasizing how urine), which was translated by software into animations
poorly modern society values the microbial realm and that conveyed the overall status of the biofilm in relatable
discards nutrient-rich resource streams as “waste,” the terms. Audiences could, therefore, respond to the microbial
installation invited audiences to adopt an ethical position behavior, not by looking at unpleasant “slime” (the natural
in relation to resource recycling and consider what kinds “face” of microbial colonies), but instead by interacting with
of transactions are acceptable for activating the microbial appealing forms on a familiar screen-based interface. This
commons. world of “Mobes,” a characterful term coined for the data-
based representations of microbes, offers a simple, probiotic
11. Active Living Infrastructure: Controlled approach to interspecies communication within the highly
Environment (ALICE) situated realm of microbes, in a relatable manner that could
The ALICE prototype (2019 – 2021) advances the ambitions even become part of our everyday routines establishing
of the Living Architecture project by establishing the first bio- new value systems that invite different kinds of (house)
digital interface using its 15 MFC complexes to establish the work as well as stimulating alternative domestic routines
foundations for collaboration with microbes using electron for our living spaces (Figure 7). Since MFCs are living,
flow as a real-time language (Hughes & Armstrong, 2021). possessing a force and agency of their own, they require our

Volume 5 Issue 1 (2023) 7 https://doi.org/10.36922/jcau.157