Locating and patching cracks in old concrete is a time-consuming business, but rebuilding concrete structures is expensive. Jonkers thinks the solution is to fight nature with nature: he suggests combating water degradation by packing the concrete with bacteria that use water and calcium lactate "food" to make calcite, a natural cement. — newscientist.com

eMotion researches the museum-going experience experimentally.
At the heart of the project is the investigation of the psychogeographical
effect of the museum on the museum visitor. — NYT

The Land Art Generator Initiative just announced the winner of its 2012 design competition moments ago in New York City. "Scene Sensor", designed by artists James Murray and Shota Vashakmadze, is a striking piezoelectric energy-generating art project designed to be installed above and below the surface of the Staten Island park. — Inhabitat NYC

In the same way that structural deficiencies can be detected with something solid, two engineers from Brigham Young University--Brian Mazzeo and Spencer Guthrie--are listening in for the tell-tale acoustics by splashing bridges with water. They're looking for something called "delamination." — popsci.com

Husband-and-wife team, and 2012 SCI-Arc graduates, Liz and Kyle von Hasseln are the recipients of the inaugural Gehry Prize. The couple was recently presented with the prize for their outstanding masters thesis Phantom Geometry, a unique 3D printing method developed in the SCI-Arc Robot House with advisers Devyn Weiser and Peter Testa. This summer, the school had received a $100,000 gift from architect and SCI-Arc trustee Frank Gehry for the establishment of the institute's annual Gehry Prize. — bustler.net

The Principals' latest exploration of interactive architecture, Wave Dilfert, reads the changes in light and shadow occurring within it, catalogs and calculates them, then pulses, contracts or expands in reaction. — Mocoloco

Last week, Raj Patel, principal and acoustic consultant at Arup treated the crowd at Yale School of Architecture’s Sound of Architecture Symposium to a presentation on his company’s Sound Lab. The Sound Lab uses a battery of speakers arranged in a spherical configuration to mimic the acoustic properties of a digital architectural model. In real time, designers can change the shape of a hall, the material of the seats, the angle of the walls, and hear how it might affect the acoustics... — metropolismag.com

The latest update brings 25 million new building footprints to Google Maps, making Google’s map offering even more detailed and comprehensive.

The new building footprints have been created by a computer, which processed actual aerial imagery and rendered the shapes of buildings in the maps.

Users can help out and fix inaccurate building footprints in Google Map Maker, as well as assign businesses to existing buildings or even draw the entire building footprints themselves. — mashable.com

a Danish architect and part-time aviation journalist is mapping each claimed shoot-down of Assad’s jets and helicopters, resulting in the first running tabulation of the cost — at least in terms of machinery — of the escalating Syrian air war. Bjørn Holst Jespersen’s map, sponsored by journalist David Cenciotti’s blog The Aviationist, marks 19 possible “kills” by rebel forces, as reported in the press or seen in YouTube videos. — wired.com

After seven years of teaching structures to a mixed group of architecture and structural engineering graduate students at MIT, Paul Kassabian found that many of his future architects took a just-enough-to-get-the-homework-done approach to understanding those fundamental components. So he created an app to help them out. — fastcodesign.com

From the Eiffel Tower in Paris, to St. Basil’s cathedral in Moscow, to the Forbidden City in Beijing, the architecture featured in Clover is among the world’s most memorable. “We purposely selected works that most children would find fascinating,” says Josh Heidebrecht, Clover co-creator and Soma Creates founder. “Each building is from a different culture and shows a different perspective on the world.” — sfgate.com

These two concepts — crowdfunding and urban improvement — have been married by several recently launched startups, both in the U.S. and abroad. These civic crowdfunding startups tap local communities and businesses to raise money for community centers and urban beautification, giving citizens a sense of ownership and a stake in the future of their cities. — mashable.com