Aquatic Fibril

Approaching in a holistic way zones with multidimensional identities such as Evros area in North East Greece, is extremely challenging. Evros is undergoing significal ecological transformations because of its fragile ecologies. Especially in Evros’River, different factors affect the delicate balance of the local ecologies. First, we made a research on the main geopolitical and ecological issues at state of Evros. By that, we developed a perception of the characteristics of the site and we conclude that a major issue is the imbalanced local ecologies as an intersection of the 3 nations Greece, Bulgaria and Turkey that lead to huge wastes which goes through the Evros River. After our acquaintance with the site we confirmed that the pollution and toxicity is an actual fact. The site analysis focuses on how urban waste, livestocks,agriculture and industy cause huge problems on the territory because of their toxic nature.

Additionally, soil erosion is a natural process that is accelerated dramatically due to human activities, land-use and extreme weather conditions. The Mediterranean due to climate and geomorphology characteristics (heavy rains after dry periods in areas with steep slopes and lose ground) are particularly prone to corrosion phenomena. The calculation of soil erosion is performed using five key factors like rainfall, soil erosion itself, topography, cultivation and vegetation.

It pushed us to examine also the vulnerability of the ground and the grounwater firstly based on the vegetation, the ground slope and the existence of metamorphic rocks, secondly the upperlevel sediments and the permeability of the overlying formation and lastly the degree of groundwater vulnerability. So we made a groundwater risk map. The largest area of Evros is of moderate vulnerability (47,8% ). It consists of extensive sedimentary formations of large capacity that act as a natural filter for toxicity and pollution that move from the surface to the groundwater and they are located in the flat areas in the southern part.

After we examined the natural qualities of the site. There are geological formations basically on the basin of the river as granular alluvial and non alluvial deposits and molassic sediments(64%) and the rest part is covered by impermeable metamorphic and Plutonian/ Volcanic rocks (36%). There are also interesting terrain formations in the area. Aqua culture has great fact as there are many endangered species.

In order to restate flora and fauna we made a great investigation on how natural ecosystem itself has qualities to reduce toxic phenomena. We thought of looking for bacteria that grows on wetlands like Evros that have abilities of absorbing toxic elements and helps nutrient cycle. Mycellium is a natural element of these kind of ecosystems which thrive in ecologies with high levels of toxicity and humidity. Mycelium is a very thin-thready root system of fungi that acts as decomposers which is critical to the carbon. Our thought is to use toxicity of the wastes to our benefit through investigation of mycellium not as a material but as a mechanism to absord toxicity. So we examined the properties and potentials of Mycellium as a morphology and structure to investigate architectural spaces. We examined the characteristic of the Mycellium. It is interesting the branching filamentous system of Mycellium growth, the connectivity, the integrity, the aggregation of interconnected networks and the intelligences that operate as a central role.

After analyzing the above characteristics of mycelium we proceed on physical experiments by imitating the morph and structure according to the density of the hyphae, the number and the size of nodes, the stability and the ability to form membranes. We used combinations of quantity and density of materials with these properties like threads, liquid hot silicone and flour. The conclusion was a complex network system of fibers, nodes and membranes was developed through the tensile strength of threads and the compressive strength of silicone. Then we focused on space qualities hierarchies, structures, surfaces and densities that will guide us to the digital simulation process and to the morphogenetic principles. It's not a literal use of mycellium but an open-ended mechanism and a long span structure. It is interesting to recapitalize the results of the physical experiments.

We complete a cycle of a series of experiments that lead us to the construction of a virtual machine that helped us to manoeuvre in multiple approaches. The Machine we made is a paradigm, a potential and conditional situation of our experiments. It is an emergent behavior in a digital environment. So our machine consists of the development of complex systems by the manipulation of certain parameters and the iteration of simple rules. We generated boids and through a loop process they grow changing their behavior because of vector system influenced by different factors. The result was multiple variations of network systems. The conclusion was a coherent system able to produce heterogeneous spatial outcomes of increasing complexity.

After a number of simulations we focused on structures produced by the variations of all the parameters together. We gave all our attention to these structures because these emphasize the complexity and have an increased density. This density offers a higher amount of surfaces that will be in contact with the ecology (water, air etc) which for us means more receptors of toxicity.

We tried to stabilize the toxicity that is caused by 3 nations in an indirect connection so as to eradicate it. The fish stocks are overexploited and depleted so the ecosystem is imbalanced. The project is a system of spaces that host important uses each time for the Evros area. The site where we are trying to explore potential qualities for architectural uses is the lake of Nimfes, in the South parts of Evros, where the problem of toxicity has caused major problems in the ecosystem and especially on flora and fauna. Through connections between architectural uses and landscape qualities we made a system of different types of connection (linear, bundling and relaxed by producing nodes and branching systems) so as to depict the connectivity. We emphasized this relations as agents. As the system evolves, ‘wires’ first bundle up, then twirl and bind to each other. The bundle then split and separate to wrap around volumes of space that are then translated into spaces. As the ‘wires’ create attachments - density on the structure they are leaded to create solid spaces so as to host architectural uses. This was a mesh manipulation process.

We explored architectural spaces and uses through territory investigation by approaching the landscape as a system of network of flows and connections and we finally resulted on architectural spaces.

As far as the materiality is concerned the machine Protocol is based on weaving process over the years. There is a robot that is manipulated to generate self assembled structure by collecting data of the toxicity levels in the ground to build more dense parts on the structure for architectural spaces. Polymers's engineering and design can change form and function in an intentional, programmable fashion based on a predefined mesh. This is an evolution process where morphogenetic principles arose. We decided to encourage the growth of natural elements of the site like mycelium. So practically we create a dense structure in order to host chaff. Chaff and humidity are the basic ingredients for the growth of Mycellium. So based on the natural cycle that wind blows chaff of the agriculture developed in the area and those chaff are being located on the dense parts of our basic structure, we create a fertile environment for Mycellium to grow along the semi-artificial structure. In this stage we are blending human made mechanism with natural mechanism. the important part was that we gain control over our mechanism that has a growth potentiality of spaces and could host different functions.

In order to use this potentiality to rehabilitate the problems of toxicity and fish extinction we decided to make our first test of the mechanism be creating a recycling system of aquaculture, fish farming composed by onshore tank structures. Besides, we placed seaweeds to absorb and capture dissolved inorganic waste and produce oxygen through photosynthesis and minimize the negative impacts of nutrient pollution . Also we placed suspended feeders. In addition, in order to offer economic stability and supplemental income to the Evros society we propose an open market to sale multiple products raised on the farm. It is going to cause finance growth.

In this intervention we explored something that is against the ecosystem as the toxicity by redefining the problem by using it so as to twist it. So we will use the wastes of three nations to offer a solving approach.