{"id":719,"date":"2016-08-09T10:46:15","date_gmt":"2016-08-09T14:46:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/onmymind\/?p=719"},"modified":"2016-08-09T10:51:21","modified_gmt":"2016-08-09T14:51:21","slug":"students-first-in-biodesign-challenge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.fitnyc.edu\/onmymind\/2016\/08\/09\/students-first-in-biodesign-challenge\/","title":{"rendered":"FIT Students Take First in Biodesign Challenge"},"content":{"rendered":"

I find FIT endlessly gratifying\u2014a constant source of pride and delight. Who would expect that this college, with its celebrated focus on art and design and business, would take first prize in a design competition with a focus on science?\u00a0Yet that is just what happened when, in June, at a presentation at the Museum of Modern Art, FIT\u2019s team was declared the winner of the first annual Biodesign Challenge<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Challenge, developed by a group of leading scientists, designers, and educators, involved nine colleges and universities, including some notable for their science programs, such as Carnegie Mellon, the University of Pennsylvania, and Rensselaer Polytechnic University.<\/p>\n

Submissions were aimed at demonstrating the potential of biological design to make a substantial difference in the world. One of the competition\u2019s founders, Daniel Grushkin, has said that his motivation for starting it was to witness the \u201cgrowth of a community. Artists, designers, and scientists who might ordinarily keep to opposite sides of campus came together to work with the students.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"biodesign-team\"
l-r: Gian Cui, Aleksandra Gosiewski, Tessa Callaghan, Aaron Nesser<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Our team included Tessa Callaghan, Gian Cui, and Aleksandra Gosiewski, along with Aaron Nesser, a student at the Pratt Institute. All three FIT students are studying in the knitwear specialization in the fashion design program. Together, they developed an experimental technique to literally \u201cgrow\u201d a kind of yarn from bacteria and fungi. They even produced\u2014and displayed at the MOMA presentation\u2014a sample hand-knit tiny T-shirt made from their novel material. They also developed a process to 3D print the material. Their idea serves as a demonstration project for the use of biological design to develop sustainable alternatives to the manufacture of conventional textiles.<\/p>\n