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MIT is exploring phones that put themselves together
We've seen a tiny chair that can assemble itself from MIT, but now the lab responsible for that adorable experiment has their eye on a much more complicated project: self-assembling cellphones. Specifically, MIT's Self-Assembly Lab is looking at how putting together a handful of components in a rotating tumbler could come together as a complete cellphone, Fast Company reports. It's a hard concept to grasp in words, so check out a video of the concept in action below.
MIT's self-assembling chair is cool, but you can't sit on it yet
Screw meals in pill form. We'll know we're living in the future when our furniture can assemble itself at will. It's something that MIT and others are working on, and the most recent work from the university's self-assembly lab shows how far the process has come. Before you chuck that IKEA catalog, however, you should probably be aware of one small thing: the self-assembling chair you see before you is just 15cm tall. Also, it's clearly submerged in water, so it's not very practical unless you're furnishing a new condo in Atlantica.
3D? Feh. MIT has already moved on to 4D printing (video)
The bad news: just as much of the world is starting to get excited about the prospects of 3D printing, science is moving on to the world of 4D. The good news: in the future, you might not have to assemble that Ikea chair yourself. "4D printing" is the term cientists are using to refer to a technology that MIT's Skylar Tibbits talked up during a recent TED appearance. The fourth "d" here is time, referring to an object that, once printed, is capable of changing shape (over time, naturally). "Essentially the printing is nothing new," Tibbits told the BBC. "It is about what happens after." So far the concept has been demonstrated with thin strands of plastic, which, once added to water, form into a predetermined shape, using energy from the absorption. Suggested future applications involve furniture, pipes, bikes and buildings. First, however, scientists will have to demonstrate the technology on a larger structure, of course, and they'll explore the possibility of other energy sources, like heat, sound and vibration.
