News

Watch a swarm of robots build a fiber structure The robots are here—and they’re pretty cute Photo via Mediated Matter Group Neri Oxman is an enigmatic designer. The MIT Media Lab professor comfortably straddles the worlds of architecture, art, interaction design, and synthetic biology. What comes out of that venn diagram of disciplines are, as you might guess, some pretty wild ideas about the future of architecture and materiality. Photo via Mediated Matter Group Oxman’s Mediated Matter Group recently finished a research project called Fiberbots and, appropriately, it’s a bizarre mix of robotics and sculpture. The name Fiberbots refers to...

The future of construction: Hand-built by robots? Technological convergence and disruption is driving innovation, and raising new challenges, for industries across the economy. We speak to Suzanne Gill and Helen Garthwaite, partners at Wedlake Bell and co-founders of Tomorrow’s City, Today’s Challenge about the ever developing technological landscape.  According to the World Economic Forum, however, construction and engineering have to date been hesitant to ‘fully embrace the latest technological opportunities’. This has, in many cases, led to productivity stagnation, with McKinsey estimating that if global construction sector productivity achieved its potential it would boost the sector by $1.6trn – adding 2% to...

Can artificial intelligence change construction? As IBM’s Watson adds its computational power to construction sites, tech sees an industry in need of an upgrade IBM’s Watson supercomputer has beat Jeopardy champions, reconstituted recipes, and even helped create highlight reels for the World Cup. Now it’s taking on a new tech challenge; changing how the construction industry operates. A new partnership between IBM and Fluor, a global engineering and construction company, will put the supercomputer’s computational skills to work on making building more efficient. The new Watson-based system, in development since 2015 and now in use on select projects, will be...

Preventing falls in construction Falls continue to plague the construction industry. According to OSHA, falls are the leading cause of death in construction. Of the 991 construction worker deaths recorded in 2016, 370 resulted from falls to a lower level. In most cases, workers were not wearing their fall protection properly – if at all – or employers had not provided fall protection. However, in all cases, one thing is clear: The deaths were preventable. To help reduce fall-related fatalities, OSHA advises employers to “Plan. Provide. Train.” Plan. When planning a job that will require working from height, the employer...

Here are the big-ticket construction projects Ohio State will float at this week's trustees meeting A rendering for the laboratory building at Ohio State's Agricultural Technical Institute in Wooster, Ohio. Columbus Business First has pulled together a list of big construction projects going before Ohio State University's board of trustees this week. Some projects already have been approved to start construction, but Ohio State still needs to hire the people to do it. Other projects need approval to start construction and some projects are seeking for approval for both at the same time. The majority of the projects are on...