Video Build a RanDome

See the Video Tutorial How to Build a RanDome Geodesic Shelter

A Landscape from Waste

The tessellation of cds is draped over an inflatable structure.

CDs are less and less popular lately.  Two Parisian artists from the art studio Le Centquatre decided there was no reason to let them go to waste. They sewed together over 60,000 of them. Since the CDs are flat the sheets were draped over inflatable structuresto create the dunes.

Matter and Antimatter

Photo by Rogeramjet
http://www.istockphoto.com/Rogeramjet

Everything is a polyhedron, even you and me. Just like in geometry there are duals (where each shape has a shape equal and opposing to it) in physics there is matter and antimatter. The theory holds that there is a universe equal to and opposing our own.  If you are old enough to remember when photagraphs were made in a darkroom from negatives you may understand this concept. Our universe is a mirror image in negative to our antiuniverse! Another comparison is a cookie shape cut out of dough. The cookie is the matter, the space left in the dough is the antimatter. The "Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire" (CERN) which translated to English means European Organization for Nuclear Research has a fun and informative website all about it. See the kids corner to learn about The Mystery of Antimatter or try Antimatter Academy for older "kids". You will be taken on an investigative journey through space and time to understand the very basics of matter and antimatter and how our universe and all within it is created. A word of advice: If on your voyage you happen to come across your own antimatter stay far away! Scientists have proven that matter and it's own dual antimatter annihilate one another.
 This and more interesting and exciting information about matter and antimatter can be found on the CERN website.

The Hairy Potato and other Hunger Busters

Buckminster Fuller believed that hunger and poverty could be stamped out worldwide and that it could be done within only one generation.  So did my grandmother.  She always said to me, "The world doesn't have to change - people have to change."
There is in fact enough to go around.  According to Ismail Serageldin, director of Egypt’s Library of Alexandria and the former chairman of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), the key is for this goal to be motivated by collective outrage rather than by economics.  That's pretty much what my grandmother meant I think.

The independent agricultural research centers who are coordinated under CGIAR come up with neat ways to fight hunger through science.  The International Potato Center in Peru for example developed the "hairy potato" in 1993 through genetic engineering. This potato plant grows stiff hair-like protrusions on its stem and leaves which secrete a sticky liquid. Hungry bugs just can't get to it. This saves millions of dollars each year on insecticides. Another of CGIARs member centers is the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA). Scientists here focus on developing and improving sturdy, resistant food sources like the cassava. There is also the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and a number of other agricultural science centers set on ending world hunger and continuing the support of sustainable agriculture.

"It is inconceivable that there should be close to a billion people going hungry in a world as productive and interconnected as ours. In the 19th century, some people looked at slavery and said that it was monstrous and unconscionable; that it must be abolished. They were known as the abolitionists, and they were motivated not by economic self-interest but by moral outrage. We must become the new abolitionists." from Issues in Science and Technology, Abolishing Hunger by Ismail Serageldin, 2009.

RanDome gets to Portland in the Nick of Time

Bucky' s daughter Allegra (Center) visits Lincoln Park after snowfall.
Photo by: Kim Waite

With the Nor'easter snowstorm approaching, RanDome inventor Dick Fischbeck knew time was short.  The snowfall predicted for Saturday night would leave dozens of Lincoln Park's occupants "out in the cold".  Only weeks earlier Dick's polyethylene RanDome shelter had made it's debut at MOFGA's Common Ground Country Fair. Early Saturday morning Dick strapped the still rolled up RanDome onto his car and drove to Portland.  The dome was rapidly unrolled onto the grounds.  It is serving as a community center for Occupy Maine.  Two more RanDomes have now been requested for that location. For more on this topic read the news article: Geodesic Emergency Shelter makes it to Lincoln Park in the Nick of Time. RanDome and Occupy Maine were honored by the visit of Allegra Fuller Snyder - Buckminster Fuller's daughter - on Sunday. Meet Dick in person at the Third Biennial Design Science Symposium (November 11 - 13, 2011) in Providence, Rhode Island.

Bucky Balls on Sale

For the next 24 hours you can sign into Fab and purchase a set of Bucky Balls for only 7 dollars.  With the 10 dollar credit you will get for signing up with this amazing and inspirational site the already low 17 to 27 dollar pricetag is slashed! Don´t miss out.  These magnetic balls allow you to use the sphere packing method to create amazing shapes.  Watch the many videos on Youtube to see what you can do. Bucky Balls usually cost over 40 dollars a set! Even if you are too late for the 10 dollar credit and Bucky Ball sale, join Fab so that you don´t miss future opportunities on inspirational design. This is not a toy for small children due to the very small size of the sphere shaped magnets which are a choking hazard.

Invention of Life Forms

Jitterbugs present themselves everywhere in nature.  Theo Jansen of Edinburgh in Holland has spent years "creating life" and has learned to truly appreciate the enormous task taken on by the creator of our universe. Mr. Jansen plans for his strandbeests to continue to walk the shores of Holland long after he is gone. See these and other strange and cool inventions on BBC's Wallace and Grommit's World of Invention.

Becoming an Inventor

Atari Tennis was a high-tech novelty in 1976

You are capable of inventing something that can change the world.  Don't think so?  Look at the inventors of the past. The late Steve Jobs created  the Atari Tennis game released in 1976 - hilariously simple today -  and would begin to revolutionize the way the rest of the world viewed computers.  Until that time the computer was a regarded by most people as a mega-complicated, high-tech device better left to engineers, mad scientists and science fiction writers.  "It is of no use to normal people." was the general consensus.  Earlier inventors met with similar attitudes:

• Daniel Schectman's quasicrystals were deemed impossible until he won the Nobel Prize for his discovery.
• Karl Gauss didn't tell anyone when he discovered non-Euclidean geometry because he was afraid they would make fun of him.
• Alexander Graham Bell was laughed at when he thought he could convert a homemade childrens' toy  into a communication  network. The toy was two tin cans with a string connecting them.
• Orville and Wilbur Wright were the center of jokes when they talked of their plans to test a flying machine they had invented.
• Buckminster Fuller was often called a "crackpot".

Here are some other  "Ridiculed Science Mavericks".
Watch these shows to get some inspiration on your journey to becoming the next inventor to revolutionize the world!
Building Big:  http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/buildingbig
          Domes:   http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/buildingbig/dome/index.html
Design Squad:  http://pbskids.org/designsquad
"When a true genius appears in this world, you may know him by this sign: That the dunces are all in confederacy against him." - Jonathan Swift

Folding Circles

Each of these spheres demonstrates that
triangles form where great circles meet.

The elements used to make these sculptures began as flat circles. "Children in school should be folding circles as often as they are drawing them." says sculptor Bradford Hansen-Smith who has combined art with geometry and traveled the world conducting workshops to people of all ages. He has received three patents on transformational movement systems (See definition of transformational geometry at "Fun with Geodesics"). Visit wholemovement.com to see many of his circle based sculptures, circle folding tutorials and a more detailed explanation about the wholemovement approach to geometry.

Home Boys fight against Homelessness

See our new link "Home Boys Episodes" to see the first two episodes of the Home Boys cartoon. These cartoons are less than a minute long, fun to watch and educate us about homelessness, community service, volunteer work, refugees, natural disasters and other issues surrounding the great need for temporary and permanent shelter. Would YOU like to write and direct an episode of "Home Boys"? Whether you are 2 or 200 years old, if we like it we will post it! The video should be no more than one minute long and it can be about anything as long as it is G-rated. Our main character "Doug" -- breakdancing in the picture -- is an upstanding citizen of his "hood" and is always interested in bettering his community. You can make your own cartoons at Xtranormal.com. Then send us the link to your published cartoon.

Make a Geodesic Lampshade

How do you get from this...

to this...

You can make lots of sturdy, beautiful things with triangles. Follow the link to easy-to-follow pictorial instructions on the Yanko Design website. Don't forget to attend the Maine Organic Gardeners and Farmers Association's annual Common Ground Country Fair this year.  Meet inventor Richard Fischbeck and see his patented RanDome geodesic emergency shelter -- the solution to the need for ultra low-cost transitional and emergency housing.

to this?