Engineering experts at the University of Toronto have created a multilayered fluidic system that could reduce energy from heating and cooling buildings by enhancing the intensity, wavelength, and dispersion of light that passes through windows, as per a press release on Jan. 30.
The dynamic color-changing skin of organisms like squid served as the platform's primary source of inspiration. The team claims it provides more control than prior systems while keeping prices low because it uses simple and accessible components.
In a picture taken through a window on October 19, 2009, Cambodian students walk through the rain at a flood village in Kandal province, some 25 kilometres east of Phnom Penh.
Multi-Layered Windows
The system was created by recent graduate Raphael Kay, together with Professor Ben Hatton, Alstan Jakubiec, and Charlie Katrycz.
Their prototypes are made of flat sheets of plastic that are dotted with several millimeter-thick passages for pumping fluids.
Customized pigments and other substances can also be added to control which kinds of light, such as visible or near-infrared wavelengths, pass through the fluids and how this light is subsequently dispersed.
These sheets can be assembled into a multi-layer stack, each layer handling a distinct optical function, such as regulating the intensity, removing wavelengths, or adjusting the indoor light scattering.
The technology may also enhance light transmission by adding or removing fluids from each layer using tiny, digitally-controlled pumps.
"It's simple and low-cost, but it also enables incredible, combinatorial control. We can design liquid-state, dynamic building facades that do basically anything you'd like to do in terms of their optical properties," Kay said in a statement.
Squid-Inspired
The skin of species like squid is made up of layers of specialized organs, such as chromatophores. It controls light absorption and iridophores, which influence reflection and iridescence.
Together, these components produce distinct visual phenomena made only possible by their coordinated action.
This served as the team's main inspiration for creating the multi-layered liquid windows.
Jakubiec created intricate computer simulations that examined the possible energy impact of covering a hypothetical structure with this dynamic facade, while the others concentrated on the prototypes.
Physical attributes obtained from the prototypes were used to inform these models. The team also ran simulations of several control methods for turning the layers on and off in response to shifting environmental circumstances.
Hatton points out that although humans created the control algorithms in this work, the problem of optimizing them would be a perfect task for artificial intelligence, suggesting a potential future avenue for the research.
Hatton also hopes that other academics will be inspired by the work to develop fresh approaches to regulating energy in buildings.
"Globally, the amount of energy that buildings consume is enormous - it's even bigger than what we spend on manufacturing or transportation. We think making smart materials for buildings is a challenge that deserves a lot more attention," Hatton said in a statement.
The findings of the study are published in the journal PNAS.
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