Self replicating robotic strategies as a catalyst for autonomous architectural construction

The research explores examining future trends in robotics and how they can be applied to spatial interactive architectural environments. The strategy of using modular robotics of architectural space-making demonstrates an architecture whereby adaptation becomes much more holistic and operates at a very small scale. The strategy of using self replicating strategies as a catalyst for autonomous architectural construction was very much driven by the premise of an advanced architectural design studio. This paper highlights conceptual contributions by architecture students for alternative means of Martian Colonization through means creating architecture that creates itself. The parameters of the design project had three primary considerations including: The actual trajectory issues (how to get materials to the Mars), Chemical Processing (how to make materials on the Mars) and Space Manufacturing (how to fabricate and assemble/construct things on Mars). Of these central issues explored in this studio, the focus was primarily on Manufacturing as a process carried out by small modular robotics. The premise of the approach is that rather than sending a constructed architecture to space, we send tiny robotic modules that are capable of mobility and reproduction through automated fabrication techniques using in-situ materials. The modules with embedded sensors, self-healing composites, and responsive materials were designed to construct buildings aimed at adaptation. Such buildings could potentially respond in a humanlike way to counteract loads, reduce material and allow for active environmental adaptation. When enough of architecture of the colony has constructed itself - we send humans to inhabit it.Several examples by architecture students are highlighted whereby individual modules were created within the context of a space architecture design studio and applied to scenarios of space making at various scales. The design context primarily focused on the master plan of a colony for 10,000 inhabitants. The colony is an assembly of numerous discrete yet interconnected projects that include residential, public, civil, industrial, commercial, research, healthcare, and farming etc. The environment on mars was also seriously considered including: gravity, pressure, radiation, and the mass balance of resources and waste required for sustaining human life at such a scale. Students worked in teams of two to produce complete colony designs including the detailed development and a construction/ fabrication concept for one of the buildings. Students developed scaled prototypes of the system that successfully demonstrated the robotic aspects of their project. Physical models demonstrated actual robotics, structure and materials. Biomimetic strategies were employed as a means to satisfy adaptability in terms of form, processes, and systems. Central to biomimicry within the context of the work was an understanding of the process by which organisms grow and develop including includes growth, differentiation, and morphogenesis. In terms of adaptation, the area of morphogenesis was primarily studied as a means to create an architecture that ensures a continuous turnover of cellular-like robotic modules that dynamically ensure mechanical integrity similar to that of a living, evolving system. The projects successfully demonstrate various strategies for mechanical design, locomotion and control.