MIT researchers are designing a "
Digital Water Pavillion" for next year's Expo Zaragoza in Spain. The walls of the structure are sheets of water sprayed from suspended pipes. Software-controlled valves enable the valves to be opened and closed with high accuracy to create gaps at very specific locations, forming something like liquid pixels. According to a press release, the liquid surfaces can then become "a one-bit-deep digital display that continuously scrolls downward." From the MIT News Office:
"To understand the concept of digital water, imagine something like an inkjet printer on a large scale, which controls droplets of falling water," explains Carlo Ratti, head of MIT's SENSEable City Laboratory...
The facade of the water pavilion will be like a very large display, with text, letters, and interactive patterns. "You could throw a ball at the wall, and then see an open circle drop down to meet it precisely where and when its trajectory intersected the water surface. And, with suitable programming, touching the water surface at any point can propagate patterns horizontally, along the wall, to other locations," Mitchell explains.
Equipped with suitable sensors, Water Walls can detect the approach of people and, "like the Red Sea for Moses, open up to allow passage through at any point," said (William J. Mitchell, head of MIT's Design Laboratory and former Dean of Architecture at MIT). "This provocatively subverts the fundamental architectural conception of an opening as something, like a door, found at a fixed location."
译文:
人造水墙
麻省理工的研究人员为了明年在西班牙的萨拉戈萨举行的博览会设计了一个“
数字化水墙”。这道墙的构造是从悬浮着的小管子里喷溅出一片片的水。软件控制阀门能够高精确度地去调节它的开和关，在特别的位置创造缺口，形成像液体象素那样的画面。根据一篇新闻稿报道，液体表面能够成为“一片深渊似的数字化显示器，不断地向下滚动。”以下内容是来自麻省理工新闻办公室：
麻省理工的感应化城市实验室的领导卡洛•瑞迪解释说：“理解数字化水墙的概念，把它想象成一个大型的喷墨式打印机，控制着坠落的水滴。”
这道水墙的正面看起来很像一个超大的显示器，带有文本、字母以及互动模式。米切尔解释说：“你可以丢一个球到墙上去，然后可以看到一个开放的圆环，当它的轨道分割了水的表面时，在那里恰好遇到它。并且，配有适当的设计，在任何一点触碰水墙的表面，能够沿着墙水平地传播图象到任何位置。”
配备适当的传感器，水墙能够侦测到走近的人们，并且，威廉J•米切尔（麻省理工的设计实验室领导及麻省理工建筑学院的前任院长）说：“就像红海对摩西那样，允许游客在任何一点通过。这颠覆了一个开放式建筑的基本概念，比如在某一个固定位置安装一扇门这样的习惯。”