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The ubiquous pigeon has long been viewed as vermin – spreading disease, scavenging through trash, and defecating in populous urban spaces. Yet they are a product of selective breeding for purposes as diverse as racing for our entertainment and, historically, delivering wartime post. Synthetic biology may offer this animal a new chapter within the urban fabric.
Pigeon d’Or recognizes how these birds represent a potentially useful interface for urban biotechnologies. If their metabolism could be modified, they might be able to add a new function to their repertoire. The ideas is to “design” and culture a harmless bacteria (much like the microorganisms in yogurt) that could be fed to pigeons to alter the birds’ digestive processes such that a detergent is created from their feces.
Two devices have been prototyped in this fictional narrative. One allows birds to be absorbed into the architecture of the home, from where they can be fed and cared for. The other encourages the birds to perch above the windscreen of a parked car, with the benefit that the glass will receive a dose of detergent.
By manipulating animals for human-centric goals, this project explores the ethical, political, practical and aesthetic consequences of future synthetic biology for design.
This project was developed in collaboration with James Chapell and the Centre for Synthetic Biology at Imperial College, London.
Pigeon d’Or from Tuur Van Balen on Vimeo.
via William Meyers, Bio Design Nature, Science, Creativity. Thames & Hudson