Fluid-Assembly Chair

Self-Assembly Lab, MIT
Project Leads: Skylar Tibbits, Baily Zuniga, Carrie McKnelly, Athina Papadopoulou

Fluid Assembly is part of a series of investigations by MIT’s Self-Assembly Lab looking at autonomous assembly in complex and uncontrolled environments (water, air, space etc). In this experiment a number of components are released into a tank of turbulent water. Each of the components is completely unique from one another and has a precise location in the final structure. The process was filmed over 7 hours, after which a full assembled, precise chair was created. The chair was selected to demonstrate differentiated structures as opposed to repetitive growth or self-similar structures. This experiment points towards an opportunity to self-assemble arbitrarily complex differentiated structures from furniture to components, electronics / devices or other unique structures. Once self-assembled, the structures can be removed, tested, used or disassembled and thrown back into the chamber.

This project was funded in part by MIT's International Design Center (IDC).

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Growing Islands 4D Knit Dress 3D Knit BioSuit™ Haptiknit Liquid Metal Printing Personalized Knit Masks Climate-Active Textiles Active Textile Tailoring Active Patterned Scarves Liquid to Air: Pneumatic Objects Liquid Printed Pneumatics Liquid Printed Products Rapid Liquid Printing Liquid Printed Natives Active Shoes Liquid Printed Textile Shoes Active Textile Jamming Bodies Slip-Form Rock Jamming Modular and Morphable Jamming Rock Printing Programmable Materials Transformable Meeting Spaces Transformable Screen Wall Active Auxetics Programmable Table 4D Printing Fluid Crystallization Self-Replicating Spheres Fluid Lattices Aerial Assembly Fluid-Assembly Chair Self-Assembly Cell Phone Hyperform Self-folding Proteins Autonomous Mass Assembly BioMolecular Self-Assembly Self-Assembly Line DNA Printing C-Strands Macrobot & Decibot Logic Matter