Glass Sponges
14.03.11 Filed in: Opinion
Yesterday evening, I watched a program I had recorded off ARTE a few days ago, about Biomimikry. While the concept of biomimikry isn’t particularly new (i.e. looking at how nature does things to make human engineering better), it is now, apparently, taking off not only in engineering, but also in architecture.
But what amazed me most is a section of the film that talked about glass sponges - creatures living in depths of up to 1.000 meters that produce an endoskeleton made of pure glass. The fascinating thing about this glass is: it seems by far more durable than any glass made my humans.
How on earth do you fabricate glass without a kiln? Well, that is certainly something scientists are now trying to find out. Interestingly, according to the film, about 5% of all CO2 emissions produced by mankind stem from the production of glass and cement. Being able to produce glass without the heat would really make the material that much more „green”.
The film goes on about the special structure, in which the sponge puts his skeleton together. It looks a bit like a hair curler with diagonal strands every four squares or so, along with little „U”-shaped things jutting out that connect some of the crossings. When scientists did stress-testing on constructions made of plastic that increased in complexity from that simple hair curler (basically a tube made of longitudinal strands and regularly crossing rings) to the actual structure of the sponge’s skeleton, they realized a giant increase in resistance to crushing.
The sponge also uses the optical characteristics of the skeletal glass to transmit light. It has some very special glass structures at the base, where luminescent bacteria grow, and distributes this light throughout its body so that it actually glows in the complete blackness of the deep sea.
But what amazed me most is a section of the film that talked about glass sponges - creatures living in depths of up to 1.000 meters that produce an endoskeleton made of pure glass. The fascinating thing about this glass is: it seems by far more durable than any glass made my humans.
How on earth do you fabricate glass without a kiln? Well, that is certainly something scientists are now trying to find out. Interestingly, according to the film, about 5% of all CO2 emissions produced by mankind stem from the production of glass and cement. Being able to produce glass without the heat would really make the material that much more „green”.
The film goes on about the special structure, in which the sponge puts his skeleton together. It looks a bit like a hair curler with diagonal strands every four squares or so, along with little „U”-shaped things jutting out that connect some of the crossings. When scientists did stress-testing on constructions made of plastic that increased in complexity from that simple hair curler (basically a tube made of longitudinal strands and regularly crossing rings) to the actual structure of the sponge’s skeleton, they realized a giant increase in resistance to crushing.
The sponge also uses the optical characteristics of the skeletal glass to transmit light. It has some very special glass structures at the base, where luminescent bacteria grow, and distributes this light throughout its body so that it actually glows in the complete blackness of the deep sea.
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