00:00We design architecture like living organisms.
00:07Many of the elements that are present in the air that our city produces, like CO2, NOx, PM2.5,
00:14these are pollutants for us, negative for human beings,
00:18but they are actually nutrients from other organisms, such as, for example, microalgae.
00:22It's not a question of simply using other organisms or integrating them into buildings,
00:31it's really creating an alliance with the non-human, a microbial world.
00:46I'm Claudia Pasquero, I'm co-founder and director of Ecologist Studio.
00:51I'm Marco Poletto, and I'm director and co-founder of Ecologist Studio.
00:57Ecologist Studio is a design innovation company,
01:01specialized in the advanced integration of nature in the built environment.
01:10With Ecologist Studio, we are trying to materialize the paradigm of carbon neutrality.
01:22The algae is a layer of nature that is pervasive.
01:26In fact, they are some of the oldest organisms on Earth,
01:31and so they have evolved an exceptional biological intelligence,
01:36which makes them, first of all, capable of surviving in very extreme environments,
01:42but also makes them extremely efficient at converting carbon dioxide into biomass.
01:51That's where we began to see a very exciting opportunity
01:55in terms of designing interfaces that would enable its cultivation in the urban realm.
02:06The project in Warsaw is called Air Bubble,
02:11and it takes the issue of air pollution and sort of turns it on its head.
02:17The ambition of the project is to demonstrate that it is actually possible
02:20to create a pocket of clean air where children can play safely,
02:25and do so through the application of biotechnologies.
02:31So the project in Venice is called Beat Biobot,
02:35and expands on the question of how we live together.
02:43We present a new form of azole that is inhabited by both human and non-human,
02:50and in this case, non-human are multiple species of microalgae.
02:58The azole and the pygmy, really, where the air gets changed by passing through these microalgae.
03:06Our hope is that our creations become a new interface,
03:11essentially between the natural world and the design or the artificial realm.
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