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John Ochsendorf wants to tear down Rome's iconic Pantheon. He wants to pull apart its 2,000-year-old walls until its gorgeous dome collapses. Destroying it, he believes, is the best way to preserve it.
But the Pantheon that Ochsendorf, a professor of engineering and architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has in mind to destroy is less than 20 inches high, and it's made of 492 3-D-printed blocks. It's designed from laser scans of the real building. A gaggle of MIT engineering students will place it on a table with a sliding base and pull the walls apart, then put it back together and tilt it until it crumbles.
It's hard to see how razing a doll-sized Roman monument will help protect the real thing. But Ochsendorf, whose easy smile and self-effacing humor belie confidence and determination, has a serious goal: to prove that historical structures like the Pantheon are more stable than we give them credit for. "By every measure of success of a building—from an architectural, from an artistic, and from an engineering standpoint—I would argue that the Pantheon is the greatest that was ever built," Ochsendorf says. "There's no greater definition of success for a building than it's been standing for 20 centuries."
It also represents a masterwork of engineering and a repository of ancient technical knowledge—the structural equivalent of the Mona Lisa. Ochsendorf is working to halt what he sees as unnecessary interventions in historical buildings, in which engineers try to fix cracked or slumping walls with steel bars and supports. "We see a crack in a structure and we do a major intervention, but that's akin to dipping the Mona Lisa in epoxy because one section of the painting has faded a bit," he says.
(Score: 2) by rts008 on Saturday May 23 2015, @07:33AM
I'm glad they are tearing down a model in the hopes of learning/confirming things, and I both commend them for the non-destructive technique using accurate scale models, and scientific methods, instead of harming the structures being studied. I truly wish them well, and hope they have success.
Now imagine a few years from now, along with other VR(Virtual Reality), augmented reality, more advanced version of the above scanned model, all combined with some soon to be developed 'automagical, interactive(at least freely move around observing at the desired angle, distance, and detail), thrown into a Virtual R & D lab with peers and colleagues 'telecommuting in to the VR lab' from across the globe coming up with stuff the layman will have to wonder about magic being real...and becoming normal enough to be taken for granted.
Changing the way we watch/interact with Movies, where you can 'ghost-like' explore the set, preferred POV's for scenes, get that REAL closeup could be real fun. (imagine Star Trek: TNG holodeck, but no ability to influence or interact with the holoset and holograms. Like a ghost spectator, mobile, but invisible, 'no physical substance'(in this context), no influence on the events. That would be the camera view/movie screen/ how you watch it.
I've fantasized about when movies reached this stage. I don't want to be sucked into the movie and become part of it, most of the time I just want to watch it(lurk), but have the ability to explore the set, watch it from different perspectives, etc. The truly interactive holodecks of Star Trek:TNG require 'real interaction' and involves way more sweat and work than I want to invest in casual entertainment. At other times when I wanted more realism and challenge/training, then I could turn it up to that level of capability and realism. (40 years ago as a young man, I'm sure that viewpoint was different-I would have wanted to jump in with both feet to the full realism mode)
So far in my opinion, the Holodeck of Star Trek:TNG is the ultimate gamer's setup, and I can't wait! This sounds like a mind-blowing experience that I would joyfully risk mind and life to try.
Please pardon any confusion in my comments. I will cowardly blame it on the home-made Apple Jack I have been enthusiastically Q & A testing this weekend. I can fully vouch for the delightfully potent and tasty quality of the Apple Jack, but make no claims on anything else. ;-)