oscillator:

juliasegal:

antiheroe:

(via ihatesilkepil)

What if design is hard too?

oscillator:

juliasegal:

antiheroe:

(via ihatesilkepil)

What if design is hard too?

DIYbio-boston got together on 13 Dec 2009 and hacked on $10 USB microscopes at the bosslab - awesome!

@molecularist blogged about the 22 Nov 09 diybio-boston meetup at sprout and recently posted a great little video of the tour. You can see us setting up Sprout and touring through the mobile lab.

Caroline and Micah, the crack designers behind http://weareagoodcompany.com/, are developing some illustrations and logos for diybio and the bosslab.

The idea is to create diybio logo and a complement of graphical motifs and decorations to garnish http://diybio.org, and to remix onto http://bosslab.org and all the other diybio-ish sites out there in the world that might be interested in some cool artwork. Carol and Micah are approaching this project with remixability in mind and I can’t wait to see what they come up with.

Here are some notes we came up with while brainstorming today:

initial notes

cuddly, happy, friendly, fun, game-like, toys

non-institutional:

• GRAFITTI
• NO LAB COATS! (too clinical)
• Indiana Jones was a scientist…
• GIRLTALK (was a molecular biologist, once upon a time)

illustrative elements could be part of a larger diagram

or furry microbes flying out of box (bosslab) or generic DIYbio headquarters

one possible treatment: retro game theme

encompassing sitewide image like vimeo illustration ( http://www.vimeo.com/927062 )

but simpler like http://www.offworld.com

main style is retro arcade game

elements of game are diybio concepts - a little lab with toy/pixelated lab equipment (some of it can be steampunk :) - iconic / sprite treatments of the other concepts

this retro sciece game look will help disrupt endemic science-phobia :)

Background

Harvard iGEM 2008 team website (DIY aesthetic)

Adventures in Synthetic Biology comic (look for the pdf, not the link to Nature)

SEED’s Synthetic Biology crib sheet

Hackteria.org - Open Source Biological Art, DIYbio

60-second defininition of synthetic biology

Synthetic biology abstraction hierarchy (look closely at datasheet)

Drew Endy explains synthetic bio in 10 minutes

http://www.ars-synthetica.net/archive/ - synthetic biology blog focusing on social issues, beautiful site design

Biobricks catalog (get an idea of the current parts collection)

metabolic networks are deliciously complicated

systems biology graphical notation - neato but engineers don’t sketch with it yet in practice

Major Themes

• DIY / Lo-Fi (retro) / indie
• science
• engineering
• bio-art

Synthetic Biology

• modularizing biological systems

• programming biological systems

• legos

• interfaces (hardware, functional, software)
• black boxes
• abstraction
• documentation data sheets

• pictures of molecular diagrams

• circuits, circuit components

• easier to use individual parts

• easier to build complex systems

naturalism / steampunk

• old school amateur science
• engraving illustrations, wood plates (http://www.droplet-microscopy.org/) — RETRO styles could be effective at disarming the unconscious barrier endemic in society to the unknown of SCIENCE, and hip, cool, fun, and a tip of the hat to victorian-era amateur scientist gentlemen
• punk style from 80s - stitching their own clothes, safety pins
• retro-rainbows! SCIENCE+YMCA logo! BIO-ATARI! http://polytroncorporation.com/ — (see their t-shirt design http://polyshop.store-08.com/browse/t-shirts/mens/ )

DIY & hardware

• Lo-Fi
• pixelated
• indie
• make magazine
• instructables
• duct tape
• toolbox
• old computer hobbyists in their garages

actual hardware

• pipets + tips (“the wrench of biology”)
• 1.5, 2, 15, 50 ml tubes
• culture plates
• lots of orange-capped glassware
• centrifuges
• vortexer
• spectrophotometer
• scale
• autoclave

Groups that might remix the illustrations

• diybio blogs
• diybio local labspaces / coworking spaces
• sticker artists
• igem teams

On Sunday diybio-boston peeps met up at sprout.

We took a tour of the shipping container lab and transported a bunch of equipment and basic reagents over to the labspace we’re setting up at Sprout.

First up: putting together a “biobrick playing card” transformation workshop. I’m going to procure the supplies over the next week. After the workshop, we’ll focus on optimizing the supplies and the protocol so it is as diy-friendly as possible.

Tag pictures with “bosslab” if you’ve got ‘em.