Project Description
In the Baltic Sea, you with find a growing population of algae that is spurred by polluted waters, the warming of the planet and wind. The more algae that is concentrated on the water’s surface the less daylight is able to reach the plants that live at the seabed. These plants produce oxygen through photosynthesis that allows marine life and insects to survive. However, if daylight doesn’t reach the seabed, the plants won’t produce enough oxygen, resulting in a “dead zone”. We designed Lotus, an object printed with a transparent, polycarbonate-like material, a rigid light pipe altering the direct light’s path through its printed volume. Lotus’s purpose is to draw light from above the water body’s covered surface through the algae and into the water towards the plants at its seabed. Lotus is designed to refract light into the water based on the curvature of the material as it bends, allowing the plants to receive diffused daylight beyond the direct light’s small radius. The Lotus’s diffused light will produce a brighter field of light over the plants at the seabed, encouraging photosynthesis for the production of oxygen. Lotus was also designed to be a terranium filled with enough bio-plastic to not only encourage bouyancy but also provide nutrients for small plants and insects that is necessary to clean the surface of the water.