This project which I call “Big Kahuna Inc.” is a work of design fiction that I created for the Visual Culture & Design Course.

HOW DID YOU GET TO THIS IN THE FIRST PLACE?

The following set of images is how I would represent the path taken in the Visual Culture and Design course to get to this project.

WHAT EVENTS INSPIRED/CONSPIRED FOR THIS STORY TO COME TOGETHER ?

Assuming that researchers in these areas would be successful in their endeavor in a few years, I speculate that we might end up doing promoting consumerism in Plethora similar to the way we have promoted it on Earth.
I am a huge fan of the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. The satire in Douglas Adams’s writings are quite incredible and that is something that I would want to achieve either through my sketches, or videos or any other creations. Also, I have stayed in the United States for more than 15 months now. My experiences and observations during this time have also shaped a lot of my ideas in the story. I hail from India, and the culture in the States is an interesting contrast to the culture where I have been born and brought up. So, this was a fantastic opportunity to create a work of design fiction based on research on Nanotechnology and marry it with the ideas that had been running in my mind.

WHAT RESEARCH DID YOU DO FOR THIS?

I had to research the applications of Nanotechnology in various fields. I was interested in the idea of space travel and how humans would exist in other planets. I dived deep into understanding how Nanotechnology was enabling engineers and scientists working to make space travel possible. The images related to that are captured here. Then as my story matured, I spent time researching about applications of Nanotechnology in Food and Packaging, Cosmetics. The Nanotechnology references in my story are well researched, except for the iPod Nano capsule.

(i) NANOTECHNOLOGY & SPACE

Wikipedia states that

A space elevator for Earth would consist of a cable anchored to the Earth’s surface, reaching into space. By attaching a counterweight at the end (or by further extending the cable for the same purpose), inertia ensures that the cable remains stretched taut, countering the gravitational pull on the lower sections, thus allowing the elevator to remain in geostationary orbit. Once beyond the gravitational midpoint, carriages would be accelerated further by the planet’s rotation.

Almost every conceptual design of a space elevator has the following 4 parts:

Base Station: The base station will be a mobile/stationary platform that will secure the cable on Earth.

Cable: The cable must be made of a material with a large tensile strength/mass ratio. It should support its own weight and the entire weight of the climber. A space elevator would need a material capable of sustaining 4,960 kilometers (3082 mi) of its own weight at sea level to reach a geostationary altitude of 36,000 km (22,300 mi) without tapering. This is at least necessary value, and about 50,000 kN/(kg/m) if it shows by specific strength. Therefore, a material with very high strength and lightness is needed.
Enter Carbon nanotubes. Carbon nanotubes are the strongest and stiffest materials yet discovered in terms of tensile strength and elastic modulus respectively. The current (2009) technology allows growing tubes up to a few tens of centimeters. This limit can be mitigated by spinning nanotubes into a yarn, but at the price of lowering the cable strength.

Climbers: A space elevator cannot be an elevator in the typical sense (with moving cables) due to the need for the cable to be significantly wider at the center than the tips. While various designs employing moving cables have been proposed, most cable designs call for the “elevator” to climb up a stationary cable. The conductivity of another set of cables made of carbon nanotubes can be utilized to power these climbers.

Counterweight: An asteroid or a space station positioned past the geostationary orbit can be used as a counterweight. Another idea is that the cable itself can extend far beyond the geostationary orbit. (Wikipedia)

NASA is investing a lot of money in researching the area of Space Travel. This can soon become a reality! More details in this exciting video .

(ii) NANOTECHNOLOGY & FOOD

Food Processing

Micro and Nano-sieve membranes can be applied in food processing. These nano-sieves can be used for filtration of beer or maybe even milk for cheese production. In future, they may also be used for preparing water-filled fat colloids to produce low fat milk with the same taste as full fat milk which could then be used in creamy low fat ice cream. These can also be utilized for encapsulating food ingredients like minerals in a coating of another ingredient to increase take up by the body to avoid the loss of these ingredients during cooking. (NanoBio-RAISE)

Novel foods

Food and nutrition companies anticipate a great deal of progress in Nanotechnology based novel food products. In novel foods, the ingredients which naturally occur in food are adapted for better taste, digestion or to address the specific nutrition needs of special groups such as babies, elderly or patients. Low fat milk, cheese and ice cream with the same taste as full fat products have already been mentioned. A Hungarian company has developed an ice gel for soft drinks or ice-cream. (NanoBio-RAISE)

The jelly-like ice gel consists of very small ice crystals containing even tinier bubbles of carbon dioxide. The CO2 bubbles are 1-10 nanometres in diameter, much smaller than CO2 bubbles in soft drinks. In the mouth, the ice gel causes a feeling similar to effervescent tablets.

Food Additives

At present, some food additives with nanoingredients (according to claims by the producers) are being sold in the USA and Germany. These additives are made of minerals with a nano-formulation, such as silicon dioxide, magnesium, calcium, etc. They are chiefly aimed at the diet, sports and health food markets. The particle size of these minerals is claimed to be smaller than 100 nanometre so they can pass through the stomach wall and into body cells more quickly than ordinary minerals with larger particle size. Nano-additives can also be incorporated in micelles or capsules of protein or another natural food ingredient. Micelles are tiny spheres of oil or fat coated with a thin layer of bipolar molecules of which one end is soluble in fat and the other in water. The micelles are suspended in water, or conversely, water is encapsulated in micelles and suspended in oil. Such nanocapsules can for example contain healthy Omega3 fish oil which has a strong and unpleasant taste and only release it in the stomach such as in “Tip Top Up”® bread sold in Australia. (NanoBio-RAISE)

Kraft and Nestlé are designing smart foods that will interact with the end users to customize food, odor, flavor or nutrients, color based on their choice. Kraft is developing a clear tasteless drink that contains hundreds of flavours in latent nanocapsules. A microwave could be used to trigger release of the colour, flavour, concentration and texture of the individual’s choice. Smart foods would be able to sense if the consumer was allergic to its ingredients and block the offending ingredient. Also, smart packaging can release extra dose of nutrients to people who have special dietary needs, for example calcium molecules to people suffering from osteoporosis. (Miller)

Encapsulated Food

Dr Frans Kampers, an expert in Food and Nanotechnology, says

Nanotechnology can provide microsized containers that can contain various nutrients. The supramolecular structures used for this purpose can mask undesired flavors that would spoil the flavor of the product, can protect the substances from inactivation, can improve the bio-availability of the nutrients and can deliver them to specific parts of the Gastro-Intestinal tract where they are most effective. Creating these structures in a cost effective way is not trivial and requires intricate knowledge of self-assembly mechanisms. At Wageningen UR (Physical and Colloid Chemistry) fundamental research is being done to understand these mechanisms and to find new ways to create these innovative encapsulation systems.

(2020 Science)

(iii) NANOTECHNOLOGY & PACKAGING

Current and near term applications of Nanotechnology in the packaging industry are mainly in 3 areas:

1. Barrier – to protect the contents of the package from oxygen, carbon dioxide, water vapor, UV radiation
2. Improve characteristics like strength, heat resistance, stiffness
3. For communicating ripeness of fruits like ripeSense (Ripesense), or freshness/contamination of the packaged contents.

A Helmut Kaiser Consultancy study in 2005 showed that Nano-related food and beverage packaging sales was around $860million in 2004. (Selke)
Success of packaging materials for fresh products totally depends on the control of internal gas composition (O2, CO2 pt) and water loss in packaging. Nanopackaging can create a modified atmosphere in packaging with controlled gaseous exchange, so that, for example, the shelf life of vegetables may be increased to weeks. Food will be fresh even after a long time because of the silicate nanoparticles to provide a barrier to gases (for example oxygen), or moisture in a plastic film used for packaging. This could reduce the possibly of food spoiling or drying out. The plastic of drink bottles can contain clay nanoparticles to keep oxygen or water vapour in or out. Zinc oxide nanoparticles can be incorporated into plastic packaging to block UV rays and provide anti bacterial protection, while improving the strength and stability of the plastic film. (NanoBio-RAISE)

(iv) NANOTECHNOLOGY & COSMETICS

Nanochemistry has reached the point where it is possible to prepare small molecules to almost any structure. The concept of molecular recognition is especially intriguing: molecules can be designed so that a specific configuration or arrangement is favored due to intermolecular forces. This is among the properties that can be translated to cosmetic products or procedures; the creation of nanosheets (“sheets” of atoms that form ultra- thin, perfectly smooth surfaces) might be employed to create a smooth veneer over unsightly human features. (Chapman)
ObservatoryNANO’s research explains the 2 main uses of nanotechnology in cosmetics.

The first of these is the use of nanoparticles as UV filters. Titanium dioxide (TiO2) and zinc oxide (ZnO) are the main compounds used in these applications. Organic alternatives to these have also been developed. The second use is nanotechnology for delivery. Liposomes and niosomes are used in the cosmetic industry as delivery vehicles. Newer structures such as solid lipid nanoparticles (SLN) and nanostructured lipid carriers (NLC) have been found to be better performers than liposomes. In particular, NLCs have been identified as a potential next generation cosmetic delivery agent that can provide enhanced skin hydration, bioavailability, stability of the agent and controlled occlusion. Encapsulation techniques have been proposed for carrying cosmetic actives. Nanocrystals and nanoemulsions are also being investigated for cosmetic applications. Patents have been filed for the application of dendrimers in the cosmetics industry.

L’Oréal has a number of Nanotechnology-related products in the market and ranks 6th (as of April 2009) in US in the number of nanotech related patents in US. L’Oréal researchers have been tinkering with nanotech since the 1980s. The company’s first nanoproducts, introduced about 15 years ago, were nanosomes, tiny capsule-like structures that transport active ingredients, such as vitamins, into the skin’s outer layer, and then release them. Nanosomes and similar agents, known generally as nanosystems, are used in skin creams such as L’Oréal’s RevitaLift. As long as there’s a chance nanoscience can unlock the secrets of youth and beauty, companies such as L’Oréal should have no trouble attracting customers. (BusinessWeek)

The above research enabled me to understand the fundamental uses of Nanotechnology. It was vital for me to understand this before creating this piece of design fiction. The uses of Nanotechnology shown in the video are a fictional extension of the current state of the art in this field.

HOW DID THE FINAL PRODUCT COME TO LIFE?

Initially, I was interested in exploring how we, the current breed of humans, would react if we were able to go to a different planet and settle down. Hence, I did a lot of my research on how Nanotechnology could make space travel possible. The images related to that are captured here

One of the facets that I wanted to explore was how would the current crop manage our lives in another planet without smartphones, connectivity to the internet, away from virtual farms. One idea that I was really keen on pursuing was sending Calvin to space using the Space Elevator and create a cartoon strip based on that. However that did not materialize.

I was still contemplating about the final product that I would create. I explored if I could create some intelligent device or product that we would find useful in outer space. So then it would be a great exercise to explore how the product can be feasible. I also considered creating some information brochure or a marketing gig for a travel agency, who were trying to get customers to travel to outer space.

None of them were as convincing as the ideas I had for a story. I was able to start off with the idea of a big company trying to spoil a beautiful place by making it more “consumer-friendly”.

Once, I had the story in place, the best way to represent it I thought would a video. I decided to create a video of still images and have a voiceover for the narration. I created a slideshow in Powerpoint so that I could narrate as if I was the CFO of Big Kahuna Inc. giving a presentation to the shareholders. Some of the ways I thought of representing the text and images in my slideshow.

I tried this one,

And finally fixed on this layout after trying out all layouts

From the design critique, I got feedback and ideas on how to make the connection to Nanotechnology even stronger. That led to me adding the concept of a joint merger of Big Kahuna Inc. and Apple Nano

I searched a lot for getting really good images. Flickr and the advanced image search on Google being my best friends. I got most of the images that were 720px by 540px (standard template size of Powerpoint slide). Once I had the images, I used the Camtasia Recorder to take the screencast of the Powerpoint presentation. Thanks to my TA, Chris, who has an awesome recording studio at home, I was able to record the voice-over. (I think an American voice-over would have been more authentic, thats for version 2.0). Using Camtasia I produced the final video, which can be downloaded from here
I did not include exact Nanotechnology definitions in the video (it would not have gone well with the sales presentation), but all the ideas in it were extrapolated from the research that I did.

This was my first attempt at Design Fiction. I hope you enjoyed it. :)

REFERENCES

IMAGES

The link below is my background research and ideas for a project on Nanotechnology and Space Travel.
The idea is not yet finalized and nor is the form factor of the end product. This is just the initial research and whatever ideas I had in my mind for a project.

Nano-SpaceTravel-Research

The objective was to create an interactive timeline for events in Nanotechnology. I wanted to tailor the content and design in the timeline to school children and people who have some idea about science but not much idea about nanotechnology. For interacting with the timeline, I wanted to make it more playful, so I started with this idea where users could interact with the nanobot on the timeline to navigate. Also, there was a section on the right of “Who”, “What”, “When”, “Why”, “Where” questions that show text or images on hover or clicking on them.

I got feedback from the critique in class, most important being that I had a lot of whitespace to handle. Using that and also trying out an idea I had initially of putting the timeline in perspective with either events in history or events in Space Exploration (a subtle hint of scale comparison) , I came up with the wireframes below.

Since the timeline on the right giving too small an affordance to the user, I decided to bring in the center, where it will be more clear and easy to use. This led me to think of the idea where the interactive timeline can be like a book which the user reads through. Hence, the events could also be navigated through using the tabs of the pages (something like tabs in a diary/journal). The timeline in the center could act as the divider of the pages in the journal.

An interesting problem with the design above was that , the timeline in the center was sort of an anamoly. The tabs would help the user flip through pages from left to right. However the timeline in the center contradicted this because the user has to move the nanobot vertically to interact with the timeline. Also in general we perceive the increase of time from left to right. So I decided to keep the design simple and removed the timeline with the nanobot in the center.

Also, I decided to have an equivalent event in the history of space/astronomy on the right page which would put the importance of the nanotechnology event in some perspective. This content would initially be grayed out and the user can click on the link to highlight it.

The final design looked like this

The link to the timeline - http://naduism.com/design/nano-timeline.html

Works Cited:

1) Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org

2) Timeline of Astronomy, Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_astronomy

3) History of Nano http://www.discovernano.northwestern.edu/whatis/History/HistoryPopup

4) Nano Werk http://www.nanowerk.com/nanotechnology/introduction/
introduction_to_nanotechnology_1.html

5) Nature Nano August 2010 Volume 5 No 8 Cover Photo

6) The Foresight Institute, http://www.foresight.org/nano/applications.html

7) The Van Duyne Group, http://chemgroups.northwestern.edu/vanduyne/research_overview.htm

8) Camp Internet, Home School Campus, http://www.rain.org/homeschool/chemistry/img/atom1.jpg

9) Highlights in Chemical Technologies, http://www.rsc.org/Publishing/ChemTech/Volume/2008/05/nanoscale_detection.asp

10) IBM Research History Highlights, http://www.research.ibm.com/about/top_innovations_history.shtml

11) STM Image Gallery, http://www.almaden.ibm.com/vis/stm/gallery.html

12) Fraunhofer IKTS

13) TopNews.in http://www.topnews.in/artificial-black-hole-lab-generates-hawking-radiation-225323

14) C60 Molecule, iStockphoto.com/David Freund

15) Biological Applications of AFM, http://www.chembio.uoguelph.ca/educmat/chm729/afm/applicat.htm

16) PhysOrg http://www.physorg.com/news141920703.html

17) Astroprof’s page http://astroprofspage.com/archives/1100

18) StarChild, http://starchild.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/StarChild/whos_who_level2/gagarin.html

19) Nanotech Web, http://nanotechweb.org/cws/article/tech/32707

19) Nanotech Companies, http://nanotechcompanies.us

20) Thompson, Michael “Latro: Algae Powered Lamp” http://www.miket.co.uk/images/Latro.pdf

Wikipedia defines Nanotechnology as

Nanotechnology is the study of the controlling of matter on an atomic and molecular scale. Generally nanotechnology deals with structures sized between 1 to 100 nanometer in at least one dimension, and involves developing materials or devices within that size. Nanotechnology is very diverse, ranging from extensions of conventional device physics to completely new approaches based upon molecular self-assembly, from developing new materials with dimensions on the nanoscale to investigating whether we can directly control matter on the atomic scale.

In this blog post and the next, we discuss and analyze some images related to Nanotechnology drawing from Roland Barthes’s “Rhetoric of the Image” (32-51) and Bruno Latour’s article: What is Iconoclash? Or is there a world beyond the image wars? in the book Iconoclash (16-40).

HOW TO SELL SOCKS OF THE FUTURE:

FIRST IMPRESSION

The first glance of the image above can make us think in different directions. We can imagine this to be an image for boots that can take the shape of our foot. Can these be socks? But then socks are not so sturdy. Can this sock be worn directly as we wear a shoe? This creates curiosity and we want to know more about the image. From the first glance one can understand that there is a person who is trying to put their foot in the sock-lookalike object.
Different interpretations can be drawn by the viewers of the image based on their cultural background and lifestyles. These different interpretations of the “signified”, (in this case the strange looking sock) is termed as Slippage.
The sock and the feet are objects in the image that we are familiar with. Also we know that socks do not have the property of being sturdy. All that is needed to understand this is the knowledge bound up with our perception. According to Barthes, this is a non-coded symbolic message (36)

DON’T LET IT SLIP

The above image was the winning entry for the Nano Supermarket Contest held this year (Next Nature). This image communicates its central idea more clearly. The text supporting it enables it to do so. The text attached to the message serves 2 purposes -

1. It tells us what the product is about – NANO SOCK
2. What is particularly special about the product – Socks that are self dressing

The large font size of the caption NANO SOCK stands out when we see the image. This provides us the anchorage (to avoid slippage) to our interpretation of the image. We begin to understand that the Nano Sock is robust (as it can take shape and stand straight). Since it is robust, we do not need to bend over and wear it. That is a huge advantage for old or disabled population.

The Nano-Sock is designed in such a way that it eliminates the need for the user to bend over and put on his socks. Different types of nanotechnologies enable the sock to sense the human foot and pull itself up. The sock dresses itself (Next Nature).

The depiction of the sock resembles a shoe in this image. This is very useful in driving home the concept of self dressing. There is still some stability that we can attach to the person standing even though he/she is on one foot.
Awareness about Nanotechnology is growing (Maynard) and is is also facing some challenges (Devitt). As it happens with every emerging technology, people take time to become comfortable with it. Nanotechnology, in the example above, is shown as something that’s simple and calm. The image gives a feeling that such a technology can solve simple everyday problems. This impression would go a long way in helping people get over the initial skepticism and embrace nanotechnology.

WHAT WOULD LATOUR SAY?

Latour would argue that this image would not necessarily fall in the category of a “scientific image” since it is not a part of a series of images trying to explain a scientific observation. Also, as a standalone image, it pretty much conveys everything that it can, but no scientific observations.

REFERENCES

Scientists from Yansei and Stanford University pioneered a technique
by where 30-nanometre wide gold electrodes were inserted into the photosynthesising organs – chloroplasts – of algal cells, thus managing to draw a small electrical current from algae during photosynthesis.

Step 1: Latro requires 3 basic materials for photosynthesis: water; CO₂; and sunlight. The side spout allows for topping up water and the release of oxygen, created as a byproduct during photosynthesis.

Step 2: Breathing into the handle of the lamp provides the algae with CO₂, whilst the side spout allows the addition of water and release of oxygen. Placing the lamp outside in the daylight, the algae use sunlight to synthesize foods from CO₂ and water.

A light sensor monitors the light intensity, only permitting the leeching of electrons when the lux level passes the threshold – avoiding algae malnourishment. Energy is subsequently stored in a battery ready to be called upon during hours of darkness. Owners of Latro are required to treat the algae like a pet – feeding and caring for the algae rewarding them with light (Thompson) .

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

These images above explain how nanotechnology is being used to create energy efficient products. These images, perhaps can be said to be an an over-simplified way of explaining the working of the Latro algae lamp. The important point here is that even for such a simplified explanation, the author had to create multiple images to communicate his point. If the author had tried to explain this in one image, either the audience would have been confused (because it would be complex) or miss the point entirely(over-over-simplified).
The above set of images and corresponding text is an appropriate example of how in science, most of the time, we need multiple images and related text to tell the entire story. Assume that a group of people (say including scientists as well) are shown only the last image of the glowing lamp. Very few of them (if any) will be able to come up with an accurate explanation of what’s going behind the scenes in that image. This is because of the nature of scientific images, which tend to elucidate observations better when presented in a group as compared to isolated images. As Latour points out

An isolated image is meaningless, it proves nothing, says nothing, shows nothing, has no referent. Why? Because a scientific image, even more than a Christian religious one, is a set of instructions to reach another one down the line … The whole series has meaning, but none of its elements has any sense (34).

The above is an apt example of the “cascade of images” that Latour talks about (32)

WHAT WOULD BARTHES SAY?

On seeing the set of images, Barthes would point out that the text associated with them act as the anchorage required to understand the concept behind Latro. The text was how the meaning was getting into the image. Barthes would also make mention of the fact that the non-coded symbolic message (36), (the images stripped off the text) would not make much sense as they are not tied together any more.

A SMALL PARADOX

Self-illuminating flowers of Pandora. This picture is created from a high resolution SEM image of a zinc oxide “nanoflower” synthesized by a physical vapor deposition technique (Shi).

Skinpaper is a product that combines current developments in nanotechnology with the multiple uses of paper to form a scaffold supporting skin cell growth. The paper-like scaffold, in the form of a small notebook, is designed to accept the epithelial cells of the owner, while keeping them alive and nourished, effectively taking a biological snapshot of the owner’s skin (Harden & Lanza).

If one is asked to explain the the image of the Zinc Oxide “nanoflower” without the knowledge of the supporting text, then a decent guess would be – ” a painter’s bright and beautiful rendition of flowers”. When the fact about the image being a “natural phenomena”, (with the involvement of the human hand being that of brightening the colors) is disclosed, there is a certain respect and admiration generated for the image. This is similar to what Latour talks about how disclosure of human involvement in a religious artifact reduces its’ effect.
Skin Paper is just a concept by designers, but technology can make it possible is some years. When one sees the image and reads the text to understand that we can have our own Skin Diaries, there is a sense of amazement attached to it. People do believe that such a thing is actually possible in the near future. There is trust in human endeavor to reach this seemingly unreachable goal. Human involvement means that more people were committed to it and hence the work has a better the grasp of reality (Latour, 21). This can be seen in stark contrast to the Self-illuminating flowers of Pandora, where removing the human hand increased the impression the image made on the mind of the spectator.

IN SUMMARY

Summarizing the 2 blog entries, we saw images that are used to market products of Nanotechnology and images that are used to explain/represent Nanotechnology. Given the tools of analysis that Barthes and Latour provide, these 2 blog entries have evaluated these images and tried to explain how we make sense of them. Barthes and Latour provide us different lenses that are useful in examining images.

REFERENCES

Thompson, Michael “Latro: Algae Powered Lamp” http://www.miket.co.uk/images/Latro.pdf

Harden, Vanessa and Tomasso Lanza, “Skinpaper” http://vanessaharden.com/?p=404#625553/Skinpaper

Shi, Jian “Self-illuminating flowers of Pandora”, University of Wisconsin, Madison. http://www.mrs.org/s_mrs/doc.asp?CID=1803&DID=171434

Barthes, Roland “Rhetoric of the Image.” Image, Music, Text. Ed. and trans. Stephen Heath. New York: Hill and Wang, 1977. 32-51

Latour, Bruno “What Is Iconoclash? Or Is There a World Beyond the Image Wars?”. ICONOCLASH: Beyond the Image Wars in Science, Religion and Art.

Next Nature http://www.nextnature.net/2010/07/nano-supermarket-%E2%80%93jury-report/

Materials Research Society, “Science as Art” Images http://www.mrs.org/s_mrs/doc.asp?CID=1803&DID=171434