Thursday, January 26, 2012

The Brittle Star's Apprentice (preview)

Feature Articles | More Science Cover Image: February 2012 Scientific American MagazineSee Inside

Chemist Joanna Aizenberg mines the deep sea and the forest wetlands for nature's design secrets and uses them to fashion new materials that may change the world


Image: Photograph by Jared Leeds

In Brief

  • Who: Joanna Aizenberg
  • Vocation|Avocation: Runs a biomimetics lab
  • Where: Harvard University
  • Research Focus: Takes inspiration from nature for designing new types of materials.
  • Big Picture: ?What we do, then, is study interesting biological systems, but with the eyes of a physical scientist.?

Among the first things you notice when you step into the corner office of Harvard University professor Joanna Aizenberg are the playthings. Behind her desk sit a sand dollar, an azure butterfly mounted in a box, a plastic stand with long fibers that erupt in color when a switch is pulled, and haphazard rows of toys. Especially numerous are the Rubik?s cubes?the classic three-by-three, of course, but also ones with four, five, six and even seven mini cubes along each edge. An eight-year-old would be in heaven.


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