Carlo Ratti is a civil engineer and architect who teaches at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he directs the SENSEable City Laboratory. This lab studies the built environment of cities -- from street grids to plumbing and garbage systems -- using new kinds of sensors and hand-held electronics that have transformed the way we can describe and understand cities.
Other projects flip this equation -- using data gathered from sensors to actually create dazzling new environments. The Digital Water Pavilion, for instance, reacts to visitors by parting a stream of water to let them visit. And a project for the 2012 Olympics in London turns a pavilion building into a cloud of blinking interactive art. He's opening a research center in Singapore as part of an MIT-led initiative on the Future of Urban Mobility.
For more information on the projects in this talk, visit SENSEable @ TED >>
As usual, the TED community has lots of news to share this week. Below, some highlights. Bike on the Seine … literally. Carlo Ratti Associati unveiled a concept for the Paris Navigating Gym, a boat that would use the energy from passengers’ stationary-bike workouts to propel itself through Paris along the Seine. Aboard the 20-meter-long […]
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