Caption: Earthen Rituals, exhibited at the 2026 Venice Architecture Biennial, is constructed with 3D-printed earthen materials by Lola Ben-Alon and the Natural Materials Lab. Credit: Alessandro Terranova
An ingredient that gives ice cream a creamier texture could make natural earthen materials like clay and sand easier to 3D-print into durable structures, according to new research led by scientists at the University of Colorado Boulder.
The discovery could help turn construction waste into building materials with lower environmental impact.
“From termite mounds to adobe buildings, humans and animals have been building with earth since the dawn of time,” said Wil Srubar, professor in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering. “But there hasn’t been a lot of science to how earthen builders design the materials. So, we wanted to use scientific knowledge and tools to understand it.”
In nature, termites construct towering mounds. Wasps build intricate nests, and honeycomb worms create reef-like structures along coastlines. Rather than relying on cement, these organisms use biopolymers, which are large biological molecules that act like glue, often found in saliva, to bind natural materials like soil and clay together.
Inspired by nature’s designs, Srubar and his team, including researchers at Columbia University in New York, set out to investigate which biopolymer could bind earthen materials and make them 3D-printable.
The team tested five biopolymers, including legume-derived guar gum, locust bean gum and cassia gum. These compounds are commonly found in food products like salad dressings to keep oil and water from separating. They also studied sodium alginate, derived from seaweed, and xanthan gum, produced by fermenting sugar.
The researchers found that locust bean gum could hold earthen materials tightly together by binding soil particles into a stronger network. But that same effect made the material harder to push through a 3D-printer nozzle.
Sodium alginate, often found in ice cream and used to make spherical foods like popping boba, produced the opposite effect. Instead of functioning like a glue, the polymer changed the electrical charges on clay particles, causing them to repel one another, similar to how the same poles of two magnets push each other away.
As a result, adding sodium alginate to clay and sand produced materials that allowed the particles to suspend in a stable mixture while still flowing smoothly through a 3D printer.
Then the team searched for the best formulation. To natural earth excavated from a granite quarry near Golden, Colorado, they added just 0.12% of sodium alginate, which produced a material that was both strong and printable. It could withstand 25% more pressure than earth without the biopolymer and could be printed 33% faster.
Using the formula, the team printed an 8-millimeter-thick (0.3-inch) wall that leaned outward at dramatic angles. They found that the structure could remain stable even when tilted to 60 degrees, far steeper than the Leaning Tower of Pisa.
While the current study focuses primarily on improving the printability of earthen materials, Srubar said scientists could use the same framework to test other biopolymers for enhanced properties such as strength and durability.
“There are some good indoor environmental benefits of having earth in a building,” said Samuel Armistead, a research associate in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering. “It can regulate indoor moisture and uptake air pollutants. It can also serve as a thermal insulator, keeping things cool in the summer and warm in the winter.”
Construction projects often generate large amounts of excavated soil when workers dig foundations, basements, or parking structures. Much of that material ends up in landfills.
“Our study suggests that there are ways to reuse waste earth material onsite, and that could largely reduce the environmental footprint of construction,” Armistead said.
Because clay and sand are widely available, Srubar said the team’s findings could help builders around the world to tap into local resources.
“Clay and sand are among the most abundant building materials on Earth,” Srubar said. “The science and engineering we’re developing can be applied almost anywhere in the world.”
Bio-inspired 3D-printed earthen materials and structures by Samuel J. Armistead, Yierfan Maierdan, Olga B. Carcassi, Rebecca A. Mikofsky, Shiho Kawashima, Lola Ben-Alon & Wil V. Srubar III. Nature Communications volume 17, Article number: 5380 (2026) DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-026-71885-z Published: 18 April 2026 Version of record: 18 June 2026
This paper is open access.
The Columbia University researchers mentioned in the news release are associated with the Natural Materials Lab in Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation. The specific project is Earthen Rituals.
Seawalls and other unyielding structures meant to keep rising waters at bay and to protect against storm surges can cause other significant harm to the coast, often by disrupting natural processes and accelerating erosion. The gap between protection and preservation might be bridged with a softer, nature-inspired solution, according to an international research team.
In a study published on Oct. 7 [2025] in Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Research, the researchers detailed how artificial mangrove roots (AMRs) offer a viable, scalable solution for shoreline management. Inspired by the mangrove trees that grow in brackish or salty water, AMRs at two pilot sites in Thailand proved to enhance shoreline stability, dissipate wave energy and promote sediment retention, the team said.
“Coastal protection structures such as seawalls and revetments are designed to safeguard properties and infrastructure from waves and storm surges,” said corresponding author Butsawan Bidorn, assistant professor in the Department of Water Resources Engineering at Chulalongkorn University in Thailand. “However, these rigid barriers disrupt natural sediment transport and can intensify erosion in adjacent areas by reflecting wave energy seaward.”
Bidorn explained that, over time, this leads to beach narrowing, scouring — erosion caused by moving water — near the structure, and the loss of natural habitats needed to support biodiversity, recreation and tourism.
“These unintended impacts are becoming increasingly problematic under climate change, forcing coastal communities to protect one place at the expense of another,” Bidorn said. “To overcome these drawbacks, attention is shifting toward soft and adaptive solutions that can be installed rapidly, repositioned if needed, and designed to work with natural coastal processes.”
AMRs are one such solution, as they can mimic the wave-dissipating and sediment-trapping functions of natural mangrove root systems, Bidorn explained. The researchers installed AMRs at two different sites along coastlines in Thailand, each with different environmental conditions. Over a year, the researchers used remote sensing technology and site visits to evaluate the resiliency of the AMRs and the impact on the sites.
“We found AMRs can serve as an additional option for mitigating erosion in areas where hard structures have caused negative end effects. Rather than blocking waves completely, AMRs allow water to pass through and help reduce wave impact, which encourages sediment to remain along the shoreline,” Bidorn said, noting that the approach supports more natural beach behavior compared to rigid seawalls and revetments. “AMRs are adjustable, removable and scalable, which helps coastal managers respond to changing shoreline conditions without committing to permanent infrastructure.”
AMRs are not intended to replace existing coastal protection, Bidorn cautioned, but rather to complement hard structures and offer more flexibility for sustainable and community-supported coastal management.
Next, the researchers plan to improve the AMR design to better adapt to different coast conditions, as well as to continue studying how AMRs influence the areas where they are installed.
“Our broader goal is to provide coastal managers with more adaptable and environmentally compatible tools that can be combined with existing protection measures,” Bidorn said. “By offering a flexible and scalable option, AMRs can help communities respond to erosion pressures while maintaining the natural characteristics of the coastline. We aim for AMRs to support more resilient coastal management strategies, particularly in places where urgent or temporary protection is needed.”
Bidorn is also affiliated with the university’s Center of Excellence in Interdisciplinary Research for Sustainable Development.
Other collaborators are Warit Charoenlerkthawin and Thanawatth Sattabongkot, Chulalongkorn University; Narakorn Srinil and Yan Naung Aye, Newcastle University in the United Kingdom; and Ni Nyoman Pujianiki, Udayana University in Indonesia.
Chulalongkorn University and the International Science Partnerships Fund of the UK Department for Science, Innovation and Technology in partnership with the British Council, supported this work.
One more post about the 2026 Canada-Wide Science Fair (my last one was a June 1, 2026 piece highlighting the top prizes) as this work from two high school students fascinates me.
The video shows the announcement of the students’ award and their interview on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s (CBC) Calgary Eyeopener news show, Note: This segment runs about 7 mins.,
For those who might like to read about the project, a June 2, 2026 article by Kelsea Arnett for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) news online website describes the device (wearable tail) intended to assist people with balance problems,
Allen Guo-Lu and Luotong Shi aren’t your typical Grade 12 students.
While most are either busily preparing for final exams or revelling in the fact that their high school careers are almost over, Guo-Lu and Shi have spent their senior year developing wearable technology to help people battling Parkinson’s disease avoid serious falls.
“It’s our last year in Grade 12, so we were like, ‘Why don’t we try to kind of give back to the community?'” Shi told CBC Radio’s Calgary Eyeopener.
“This was one of the ways that we thought of doing it.”
The technology — a wearable battery-powered tail equipped with built-in sensors — can detect when the wearer may be unstable and act as a counterweight to help them regain their balance, Shi said.
“It essentially works kind of like the idea of a spine where there is several pieces that you can attach and the tubes act as tendons,” Shi said.
In April, [2026] the Western Canada High School students won the University of Calgary Chancellor and Senate Award at the Calgary Youth Science Fair. The project was also a finalist at the Canada-Wide Science Fair in Edmonton last week.
There are at least 120,000 people living with Parkinson’s in Canada, and that number is expected to exceed 150,000 by 2034, according to Ko Currie with Parkinson Canada.
…
Tremors and gait features like slowness, difficulty with balance or rigidity are some of the more recognizable symptoms of the disease, Currie said, adding falls are a significant concern.
“It’s one of the most disabling features of Parkinson’s, because they can lead to really serious injuries and sometimes even hospitalizations,” said Currie, who is the organization’s director of research programs and partnerships.
…
Why a tail?
Guo-Lu said the project was inspired by his volunteer work in seniors’ homes and witnessing Parkinson’s patients struggling with balance.
He said the tail design comes from witnessing how cats and other mammals use their tails to balance and correct themselves.
Guo-Lu said in testing the belt with several patients, they were able to see how the tail responded to various individual gaits and stages of progression of the disease.
“Learning about those factors and testing really helped us get a good design for the tail,” Guo-Lu said.
He added they can also change the weight of the tail depending on how much support a patient needs and what is most comfortable for them, although the ideal range was between 400 and 1,200 grams.
Users can also tailor the tail’s sensitivity to their body with an app the pair built.
Project’s benefits go beyond Parkinson’s
But the benefits of the tail extend beyond just patients with Parkinson’s, Shi said.
“This tail, because it addresses balance specifically, it honestly should benefit all people who have asymmetric gait,” she said.
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Guo plans to study neuroscience at the University of Calgary and Shi plans to study electrical engineering at the University of Waterloo.
Climate warming means more mosquitoes traveling north bring malaria and other diseases with them.Scientists at the University of Maryland have developed a new means of dealing with the coming influx. From an October 27, 2025 news item on ScienceDaily,
To combat mosquito-borne illnesses that claim hundreds of thousands of lives each year, scientists have enlisted an unexpected partner: a fungus that gives off a floral scent.
By exploiting mosquitoes’ attraction to flowers, an international team of researchers engineered a new strain of Metarhizium fungus that releases a sweet aroma similar to real blooms. The modified fungus draws in the insects and infects them, ultimately killing them.
Inspired by certain fungi that the team found emit a sweet-smelling chemical called longifolene to draw insect prey, they created what’s essentially a deadly perfume for mosquitoes—offering new hope against malaria, dengue and other fatal diseases that traditional methods, like chemical pesticides, can no longer control. The researchers documented their invention and its ability to control mosquitoes in a new paper published in the journal Nature Microbiology on October 24, 2025.
“Mosquitoes need flowers because they provide nectar, a crucial source of food for them, and they are drawn to flowers through their scents,” explained paper co-author Raymond St. Leger, a Distinguished University Professor of Entomology at the University of Maryland. “After observing that some types of fungi could trick mosquitoes into thinking they were flowers, we realized we could turbo-charge the attraction by engineering fungi to produce more longifolene, a sweet-smelling compound that’s already very common in nature. Before this study, longifolene wasn’t known to attract mosquitoes. We’re letting nature give us a hint to tell us what works against mosquitoes.”
St. Leger noted that the floral-scented fungus is an easy-to-use control method against mosquitoes, requiring little to no training or specialized knowledge. As soon as the fungus spores are placed in a container, either indoors or outdoors, longifolene is instantly and gradually released, maintaining effectiveness for months. Once mosquitoes encounter the fungus, they become infected and die within days. In lab tests, the fungus killed 90 to 100% of mosquitoes—even when placed in a large room with competing scents from humans and real flowers. Although the fragrant fungus is deadly to mosquitoes, it is harmless to humans.
“The fungus is completely harmless to humans as longifolene is already commonly used in perfumes and has a long safety record,” St. Leger said. “This makes it much safer than many chemical pesticides. We’ve also designed the fungus and its containers to target mosquitoes specifically rather than any other insects and longifolene breaks down naturally in the environment.”
In addition, unlike chemical alternatives that mosquitoes have gradually become resistant to, this biological approach may be nearly impossible for mosquitoes to outsmart or avoid.
“If mosquitoes evolve to avoid longifolene, that could mean they’ll stop responding to flowers,” St. Leger explained. “But they need flowers as a food source to survive, so it would be very interesting to see how they could possibly avoid the fungus yet still be attracted to the flowers they need. It’ll be very difficult for them to overcome that hurdle, and we have the option of engineering the fungus to produce additional floral odors if they evolve to specifically avoid longifolene.”
What also makes this new fungal technology particularly promising is how practical and affordable it is to produce. Other forms of Metarhizium are already commonly cultivated around the world on cheap materials like chicken droppings, rice husks and wheat scraps that are readily available after harvest. The affordability and simplicity of the fungus could be key to reducing mosquito disease-related deaths in many parts of the world, especially in poorer countries in the global south.
Finding effective new weapons against mosquitoes could be more important than ever. St. Leger warns that in the future, mosquito-borne diseases currently limited to tropical regions could threaten new targets, including the United States. With rising global temperatures and the growing unpredictability of weather, disease-carrying mosquitoes have begun to spread to new areas beyond their usual habitats.
“Mosquitoes love many of the ways we are changing our world,” St. Leger said. “Right now, we’re hoping to use these approaches in Africa, Asia and South America. But one day, we may need them for ourselves.”
St. Leger and his collaborators are currently working on larger-scale outdoor trials of their mosquito control method to submit for regulatory approval.
“It’s not as if you’re going to necessarily find a silver bullet to control mosquitoes everywhere, but we’re trying to develop a very diverse and flexible set of tools that people in different parts of the world can use and choose from,” St. Leger said. “Different people will find different approaches work best for their particular situation and the particular mosquitoes they’re dealing with. In the end, our goal is to give people as many options as possible to save lives.”
Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,
Engineered Metarhizium fungi produce longifolene to attract and kill mosquitoes by Dan Tang, Jiani Chen, Yubo Zhang, Xingyuan Tang, Xinmiao Wang, Chaonan Yu, Xianxian Cheng, Junwei Zhang, Wenqi Shi, Qing Zhen, Shuxing Liu, Yizhou Huang, Jiali Ning, Guoding Zhu, Meichun Zhang, Juping Hu, Etienne Bilgo, Abdoulaye Diabate, Sheng-Hua Ying, Jun Cao, Raymond J. St. Leger, Jianhua Huang & Weiguo Fang. Nature Microbiology volume 10, pages 3075–3093 (2025) Published: 24 October 2025 Version of record: 24 October 2025 Issue date: December 2025 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41564-025-02155-9
The paper’s graphical abstract presents some intriguing visuals,
Caption: Schematic representation of the A/B-sides multi-biological functional hydrogel patch. Credit: Wenle Chen from Shenzhen Second People’s Hospital, First Affiliated Hospital of Shenzhen University and Yu Wang from Wenzhou Institute, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences.
A research team from Shenzhen University, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences and Hong Kong Polytechnic University has developed an innovative, bioinspired hydrogel patch with controllable adhesion properties to enhance soft tissue repair and prevent adhesions. Inspired by octopus suction cups and the eyeball surfaces, this patch features a dual-sided design: one side offers adjustable, revocable adhesion, while the other provides anti-adhesive functions. In vivo [animal] experiments demonstrate its effectiveness in reducing inflammation, promoting tissue healing, and allowing repositioning during surgical procedures, marking a significant advancement in biomedical materials.
Tissue repair required in scenarios such as trauma, post-operative of tumors is a common challenge for human healthcare. Soft tissue injuries and surgical wounds often face challenges such as excessive tissue adhesion, which can complicate healing and cause secondary complications. Traditional patches and sutures either lack adequate adhesion or induce unwanted tissue sticking, leading to inflammation and hindered recovery. There is an urgent need for biomaterials that can intelligently balance strong tissue integration with the ability to detach or reposition easily, matching the dynamic environment of internal tissues.
In this context, hydrogel patches, owing to their exceptional biocompatibility and potential adhesive properties, are expected to become ideal materials for soft tissue repair. These materials can gradually degrade, naturally integrate with human tissues, and easily incorporate drugs or growth factors to promote angiogenesis, thereby enhancing the speed and quality of tissue healing. In general, the common hydrogel patches can be divided into adhesive ones and anti-adhesive ones. Adhesive patches can form rapid and strong covalent bonds with moist tissue to promote tissue regeneration, whose further applications are limited by excessive tissue adhesion. While anti-adhesive patches can address the tissue adhesion problem by hydrophobic surface modification or coarse structure design, they are difficult to fit the wounds tightly for treatment. Hence, it is necessitating to design an anisotropic patch combining the merits of promoting tissue regeneration and anti-adhesive function.
The Solution: Drawing inspiration from nature, interdisciplinary research team engineered a novel hydrogel patch that mimics natural mechanisms using suction cup-like structures for physical, reversible adhesion and covalent bonds for permanent fixation. The patch’s adhesive side uses microstructures that generate negative pressure for temporary adhesion, allowing surgeons to adjust its position during surgery, once aligned, chemical reactions secure a firm, covalent attachment. The other side is made of highly hydrated, anti-adhesive materials to prevent surrounding tissue from sticking undesirably. Additionally, the patch absorbs positively charged inflammatory factors and provides sustained drug release, further aiding in inflammation reduction and tissue regeneration.
The bioinspired system features a multi-functional, dual-sided hydrogel patch composed of polyacrylic acid-NHS for the adhesive surface, and polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) combined with polyethylene glycol diacrylate (PEGDA) for the anti-adhesive barrier. Its porous network not only enables physical and chemical adhesion but also captures inflammatory cytokines, fostering a more favourable healing environment. In vivo tests in animal models confirmed the patch’s strong, controllable adhesion, its ability to prevent unwanted tissue adhesion, and its capacity to promote faster, healthier tissue repair.
The Future: This innovative hydrogel patch represents a significant step forward in the field of soft tissue repair. It combines the benefits of promoting tissue regeneration and preventing adhesion into one device. Future research will focus on optimizing the patch’s properties for specific clinical applications, such as abdominal wall defect repair and other dynamic wound management scenarios. The development of advanced manufacturing technologies like 3D bioprinting could also enable the customization of patch geometry for specific anatomical structures. Additionally, the exploration of environmentally adaptive intelligent components could lead to a more precise control of adhesion and drug release that aligns with the tissue regeneration process.
The Impact: This hydrogel patch offers a new paradigm for soft tissue repair with its “revocable” adhesion properties. It has the potential to significantly reduce clinical adhesion scores, effectively reduce inflammation, promote wound healing, and enhance collagen deposition. The successful integration of controllable adhesion and anti-adhesion functions in one patch could revolutionize the way we approach soft tissue repair and adhesion prevention in clinical settings.
A July 1, 2025 news item on Nanowerk highlights research into machine vision, Note: A link has been removed,
In blinding bright light or pitch-black dark, our eyes can adjust to extreme lighting conditions within a few minutes. The human vision system, including the eyes, neurons, and brain, can also learn and memorize settings to adapt faster the next time we encounter similar lighting challenges.
In an article published in Applied Physics Letters (“A back-to-back structured bionic visual sensor for adaptive perception”), researchers at Fuzhou University in China created a machine vision sensor that uses quantum dots to adapt to extreme changes in light far faster than the human eye can — in about 40 seconds — by mimicking eyes’ key behaviors. Their results could be a game changer for robotic vision and autonomous vehicle safety.
“Quantum dots are nano-sized semiconductors that efficiently convert light to electrical signals,” said author Yun Ye. “Our innovation lies in engineering quantum dots to intentionally trap charges like water in a sponge then release them when needed — similar to how eyes store light-sensitive pigments for dark conditions.”
The sensor’s fast adaptive speed stems from its unique design: lead sulfide quantum dots embedded in polymer and zinc oxide layers. The device responds dynamically by either trapping or releasing electric charges depending on the lighting, similar to how eyes store energy for adapting to darkness. The layered design, together with specialized electrodes, proved highly effective in replicating human vision and optimizing its light responses for the best performance.
“The combination of quantum dots, which are light-sensitive nanomaterials, and bio-inspired device structures allowed us to bridge neuroscience and engineering,” Ye said.
Not only is their device design effective at dynamically adapting for bright and dim lighting, but it also outperforms existing machine vision systems by reducing the large amount of redundant data generated by current vision systems.
“Conventional systems process visual data indiscriminately, including irrelevant details, which wastes power and slows computation,” Ye said. “Our sensor filters data at the source, similar to the way our eyes focus on key objects, and our device preprocesses light information to reduce the computational burden, just like the human retina.”
In the future, the research group plans to further enhance their device with systems involving larger sensor arrays and edge-AI chips, which perform AI data processing directly on the sensor, or using other smart devices in smart cars for further applicability in autonomous driving.
“Immediate uses for our device are in autonomous vehicles and robots operating in changing light conditions like going from tunnels to sunlight, but it could potentially inspire future low-power vision systems,” Ye said. “Its core value is enabling machines to see reliably where current vision sensors fail.”
Caption: The bio-inspired metasurfaces act like a real cloud, enabling daytime cooling, heating and thermal camouflage in a single solution. Credit: Mady Elbahri / Aalto University
While I don’t have a military story for today (Remembrance Day, November 11, 2025), there is the ‘camouflage’ story. A June 30, 2025 news item on Nanowerk announces research into mimicking clouds,
How does a cloud stay cool under direct sunlight –– or seem to vanish in infrared? In nature, phenomena like white cumulus clouds, grey storm systems, and even the hollow hairs of polar bears offer remarkable lessons in balancing temperature, colour and invisibility. Inspired by these atmospheric marvels, researchers have now created a nanoscale ‘cloud’ metasurface capable of dynamically switching between white and grey states — cooling or heating on demand –– all while evading thermal detection.
There is a major global push for passive, energy-efficient thermal management in building materials, wearables, sensors and defence applications. This newly invented system fits perfectly into emerging fields like radiative cooling, adaptive coatings, and thermal heating and thermal camouflage under climate and security pressures.
Much like the transformation from bright cumulus to dark cumulonimbus clouds, this metasurface uses multiple scattering, absorption and polarizonic reflection principles to modulate light and heat. In its ‘white’ state, it strongly backscatters sunlight to enable radiative cooling, while the ‘grey’ state absorbs sunlight efficiently for high-performance heating. Crucially, both states remain ‘invisible’ to infrared sensors due to low mid-infrared emissivity — something no previous surface has achieved.
‘We’ve engineered a nanoscale cloud on every surface. It can tune its colour and temperature like a real cloud — between cooling white and heating grey — while staying hidden from thermal cameras,’ Professor Mady Elbahri from Aalto University explains.
Both white and grey metasurfaces overcome limitations of traditional coatings
Typical white paints cool surfaces by scattering sunlight in all directions, but they still glow in heat vision. This new material works more like a cloud — cooling by bouncing sunlight back and staying hidden from heat sensors.
Conventional white coatings (e.g., titanium dioxide, TiO₂ based) scatter sunlight diffusively, but are only effective in shaded conditions or at night. Their high emissivity in the 8–13 μm range makes them bright in thermal infrared imaging, limiting use in thermal stealth. ‘This new white plasmonic metasurface scatters sunlight through disordered metallic nanostructures while minimising thermal emission — cooling surfaces in full sunlight and remaining thermally camouflaged. This feature makes the innovation groundbreaking,’ says Adel Assad, a PhD student in the group.
Black materials get hot in the sun but also light up thermal cameras as they emit infrared strongly.
‘This grey surface gets hotter than black—but without sending out heat that can be seen by heat sensors. This could be a game-changer for smart textiles, building materials, and camouflage, says Moheb Abdelaziz, a postdoctoral researcher in the group.
Great potential grows from humble beginnings
The research opens new pathways in adaptive surface engineering. Potential applications span from zero-energy building facades that switch between heating and cooling to smart textiles that regulate body temperature without electronics. The discovery also presents opportunities in low-visibility sensors and devices for defence and surveillance.
The next step for the research is to explore dynamic coatings using electrochromic or phase-changing layers for real-time, user-controlled switching between states.
The researchers are proud that the remarkable findings came despite an initial project rejection.
‘With no dedicated funding after initial setbacks, we relied on shared vision and collaboration –– especially with our partners in Germany –– to turn doubt into discovery. It’s proof that science, like clouds, can rise against the odds,’ says Elbahri.
I have two stories about electronic skin (e-skin or artificial skin), each featuring a very different approach to developing the technology.
Leather for electronic skin
Michael Berger’s May 28, 2025 Nanowerk Spotlight article provides context for the research into producing artificial (electronic) skin using leather as the base,
Flexible electronics are reshaping how humans interact with machines, creating new possibilities for systems that conform to the body and respond intelligently to physical stimuli. Among the most ambitious goals in this field is the development of electronic skin—e-skin—that replicates the sensory and protective functions of biological tissue.
Real skin does more than just sense touch; it buffers mechanical impacts, regulates temperature, and shields the body from harmful radiation. Replicating all these functions in a single synthetic material has proven technically complex. Most artificial skins focus narrowly on pressure sensing or surface temperature monitoring, often falling short when required to provide mechanical robustness or electromagnetic shielding.
A variety of material systems have been explored in pursuit of a true e-skin, including hydrogels, silicone elastomers, carbon nanotube composites, and layered polymer matrices. While many of these have achieved impressive sensitivity to pressure or temperature, their mechanical fragility, structural instability, or limited responsiveness under stress have restricted their practical use. Some efforts have turned to bio-derived substrates like cellulose or silk. Although lightweight and flexible, these materials are often fragile and lack the structural hierarchy needed for reliable multifunctionality.
Leather—processed animal skin—presents an intriguing alternative. It possesses intrinsic toughness, flexibility, and a multilayered collagen fiber structure that resembles the dermal framework of natural skin. Its use in clothing and protective gear underscores its reliability.
However, until now, efforts to adapt leather for flexible electronics have been hampered by poor structural integration, limited sensitivity under dynamic conditions, and weak electromagnetic shielding. These limitations have prevented leather from advancing beyond a passive substrate into a truly intelligent material capable of emulating skin’s full range of functions.
…
Berger’s May 28, 2025 article goes on to describe a new approach to transforming leather into e-skin,
In a study published in Advanced Functional Materials (“Exceed the Traditional Dead Leather to Intelligent E‐Skin”), researchers from the University of Science and Technology of China and Hong Kong Baptist University present a leather-based composite that addresses these limitations. By integrating silver nanostructures and a viscoelastic polymer into natural leather, the team developed a multifunctional e-skin that unites pressure sensing, thermal control, impact protection, and electromagnetic shielding in a single material platform.
This composite, referred to as LAP (Leather/Ag/Polyborosiloxane Elastomer), mirrors the layered anatomy of human skin. The leather forms the outer protective surface, analogous to the epidermis. Embedded within this layer is a hybrid network of silver nanowires and silver flakes. These fill the gaps between collagen fibers, creating a dense, conductive network that functions like the skin’s dermis. The inner layer comprises a polyborosiloxane elastomer—a viscoelastic material that stiffens upon impact, much like the hypodermis’ role in absorbing mechanical shocks.
The conductive layer benefits from the combination of one-dimensional nanowires and two-dimensional flakes. The flakes act as broad conductive platforms while the nanowires link them, forming a three-dimensional network. This arrangement significantly enhances conductivity and mechanical cohesion. The optimal ratio of silver nanowires to flakes—determined to be 1:2—yielded both low resistance and high tensile strength. The material reached a tensile strength of 9.28 MPa at a silver content of 5.0 mg/cm², nearly doubling the strength of the underlying leather-polymer base. Fracture strains of up to 70.8% demonstrate the composite’s flexibility and capacity for wearable use.
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One of the most distinctive capabilities of the LAP e-skin is its dual-mode sensing response. Under slow compression, the conductive network densifies, reducing resistance and enabling precise piezoresistive sensing. The sensor detected strains as low as 2% with consistent signal output over 500 cycles. Under high-speed impact, however, the network momentarily fractures, increasing resistance instead. This difference allows the material to distinguish between light contact and sudden impacts, a feature that mimics how real skin perceives touch versus pain.
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This study illustrates how biologically inspired materials can be reengineered to achieve functional integration across sensing, protection, and regulation domains. The choice to reconfigure leather—already optimized by evolution for wearability and toughness—provides a structurally rich and mechanically resilient platform. By layering conductive and responsive components onto this substrate, the researchers have constructed a versatile material that pushes the capabilities of e-skin systems toward those of natural tissue.
Exceed the Traditional Dead Leather to Intelligent E-Skin by Yue Yao, Ziyang Fan, Xinglong Gong, Danyi Li, Wei Yang, Ken Cham-Fai Leung, Xinyi Wang, Shuai Liu, Junjie Yang, Shouhu Xuan. Advanced Functional Materials DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/adfm.202500572 First published online: 24 May 2025
Researchers at DTU have made a significant achievement by developing a new kind of electronic material that behaves almost exactly like human skin. That kind of substance could be useful in soft robotics, medicine, and healthcare.
Picture electronic devices that heal the way our skin repairs itself. Researchers at DTU have developed a new material that makes it possible—a flexible, tough and self-healing material that may in future come into use in the healthcare sector, in robotics and much more. This new material overcomes the weaknesses of the rigid, brittle electronic materials currently used, which can’t repair themselves.
By dint of an innovative approach, the scientists at DTU have combined the exceptional properties of graphene, a two-dimensional carbon form that is extremely strong, and has great electrical conductivity, with the see-through polymer PEDOT: PSS, that is also electrically conductive and is, for example, used in flexible electronics and sometimes as transparent electrodes in solar cells. When these two parts are mixed, they turn what’s usually a weak, jellylike material into a solid, flexible, self-healing electronic material.
“The devices that exist today and have self-healing, soft, and responsive properties often fail to seamlessly integrate all these attributes into a single, scalable, and cohesive platform. And that is what I believe we have accomplished,” says Alireza Dolatshahi-Pirouz, Associate Professor at DTU Health Tech and lead author of a recent paper in Advanced Science, detailing their accomplishment: Self‐Maintainable Electronic Materials with Skin‐Like Characteristics Enabled by Graphene‐PEDOT:PSS Fillers.
“Our skin-inspired material is multifunctional, endowed with the desired tactile properties, specifically designed for the usage of electronic devices. This may open the doors to the more advanced and versatile technologies that could more closely mingle with the human body and the surroundings.”
Flexible and self-repairing
Among the most promising attributes of the new material is its ability to self-heal. If it is damaged, it can heal in a matter of seconds, the way the human skin heals after, say, a cut. On top of that, the material is extremely malleable and can be stretched up to six times beyond its original length and still bounce back. This makes it well suited for integration within wearable and soft robotic devices, which require that materials can be moved and bent without diminishing their performance.
It can also control heat and detect a range of environmental factors, such as pressure, temperature and pH levels, which could make it beneficial for health monitoring systems that must keep track of vital signs and adjust to body changes.
Electronics built from this material could therefore be amorphous and shape-changing, capable of adapting to their environment, the researchers say, and able to recover from damage the way biological systems do.
“The fact that the material can self-heal, regulate heat, and monitor vital signs makes it suitable to be used in a large range of equipments, says Alireza Dolatshahi-Pirouz:
“Space suits spring to mind, but I believe that we will find the most relevant uses for the individual citizen within healthcare. We could, for instance, incorporate it in bandages that would monitor how a wound is healing, or in devices that continuously track heart rate and temperature. The stretchable nature of the material makes it ideal for minimally invasive surgery or implantable applications. And we could easily imagine prosthetics that are more comfortable to wear and have better performance.”
At present, the researchers are continuing their work and investigating methods to make it on a larger scale, aimed at setting the stage for real-life applications.
By combining graphene and a polymer blend, DTU researchers have developed a self-healing electronic material that mimics the properties of skin. Illustration: Daniel Müller.
Sharks have been evolving for more than 450 million years, developing skeletons not from bone, but from a tough, mineralized form of cartilage. These creatures are more than just fast swimmers — they’re built for efficiency. Their spines act like natural springs, storing and releasing energy with each tailbeat, allowing them to move through the water with smooth, powerful grace.
Now, scientists are peering inside shark skeletons at the nanoscale, revealing a microscopic “sharkitecture” that helps these ancient apex predators withstand extreme physical demands of constant motion.
Using synchrotron X-ray nanotomography with detailed 3D imaging and in-situ mechanical testing, researchers from the Charles E. Schmidt College of Science and the College of Engineering and Computer Science at Florida Atlantic University, in collaboration with the German Electron Synchrotron (DESY) in Germany, and NOAA [US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration] Fisheries, have mapped the internal structure of blacktip sharks (Carcharhinus limbatus) in unprecedented detail.
Results of the study, published in ACS ]American Chemical Society] Nano, reveal two distinct regions within the blacktip shark’s mineralized cartilage: the corpus calcareum and the intermediale. Though both are composed of densely packed collagen and bioapatite, their internal structures differ significantly. In both regions, mineralized plates are arranged in porous structures, reinforced by thick struts that help the skeleton withstand strain from multiple directions – a critical adaptation for sharks, whose constant swimming places repeated stress on the spine.
At the nanoscale, researchers observed tiny needle-like bioapatite crystals – a mineral also found in human bones – aligned with strands of collagen. This intricate structure gives the cartilage surprising strength while still allowing flexibility.
Even more intriguing, the team discovered helical fiber structures primarily based on collagen – suggesting a sophisticated, layered design optimized to prevent cracks from spreading. Under strain, fiber and mineral networks work together to absorb and distribute force, contributing to the shark’s resilience and flexibility.
“Nature builds remarkably strong materials by combining minerals with biological polymers, such as collagen – a process known as biomineralization. This strategy allows creatures like shrimp, crustaceans and even humans to develop tough, resilient skeletons,” said Vivian Merk, Ph.D., senior author and an assistant professor in the FAU Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, the FAU Department of Ocean and Mechanical Engineering, and the FAU Department of Biomedical Engineering. “Sharks are a striking example. Their mineral-reinforced spines work like springs, flexing and storing energy as they swim. By learning how they build such tough yet adaptable skeletons, we hope to inspire the design of next-generation materials.”
In experiments applying mechanical stress on microscopic samples of shark vertebrae, the researchers observed tiny deformations – less than a micrometer – after a single cycle of applied pressure. Interestingly, fractures only occurred after a second round of loading and were contained within a single mineralized plane, hinting at the material’s built-in resistance to catastrophic failure.
“After hundreds of millions of years of evolution, we can now finally see how shark cartilage works at the nanoscale – and learn from them,” said Marianne Porter, Ph.D., co-author and an associate professor in the FAU Department of Biological Sciences. “We’re discovering how tiny mineral structures and collagen fibers come together to create a material that’s both strong and flexible, perfectly adapted for a shark’s powerful swimming. These insights could help us design better materials by following nature’s blueprint.”
Found in warm, shallow coastal waters worldwide, blacktip sharks are sleek, fast-swimming predators known for their incredible agility and speed, reaching up to 20 miles per hour. One of the most striking behaviors they display is leaping and spinning out of the water, often during feeding – an acrobatic move that adds to their mystique.
This research not only enhances the biomechanical understanding of shark skeletons but also offers valuable insights for engineers and materials scientists.
“This research highlights the power of interdisciplinary collaboration,” said Stella Batalama, Ph.D., dean of the College of Engineering and Computer Science. “By bringing together engineers, biologists and materials scientists, we’ve uncovered how nature builds strong yet flexible materials. The layered, fiber-reinforced structure of shark cartilage offers a compelling model for high-performance, resilient design, which holds promise for developing advanced materials from medical implants to impact-resistant gear.”
Study co-authors are Dawn Raja Somu, Ph.D.; and Steven A. Soini, Ph.D., two recent Ph.D. graduates from the Charles E. Schmidt College of Science; Ani Briggs, a former undergraduate student in the FAU College of Engineering and Computer Science; Kritika Singh, Ph.D.; and Imke Greving, Ph.D., scientists at outstations of the DESY PETRA III X-ray light source operated by Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon; and Michelle Passerotti, Ph.D., a research fish biologist at NOAA Fisheries.
This research was supported by a National Science Foundation (NSF) grant awarded to Merk; an NSF CAREER Award, awarded to Porter; and seed funding from the FAU College of Engineering and Computer Science and FAU Sensing Institute (I-SENSE). The acquisition of a transmission electron microscope was supported by a United States Department of Defense instrumentation/equipment grant awarded to Merk.
Caption: An X-ray nanotomography reconstruction of the intermedial cartilage of a blacktip shark. The colors indicate the thickness of the struts, with red representing thicker areas and blue indicating thinner ones. Credit: Florida Atlantic University
The work you see in the above is being displayed at the 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale or Biennale Architettura 2025; 19th International Architecture Exhibition being held in Venice, 10.05 – 23.11 2025 (May 10 – November 23, 2025). Note: Links have been removed.
ETH researchers present a living material consisting of a hydrogel and cyanobacteria embedded in it.
The photosynthetic bacteria extract CO2 from the atmosphere and convert it into biomass and carbonate-containing minerals.
The 3D-printable building material is intended to help reduce the carbon footprint of buildings and infrastructure in the future.
At the Venice Biennale and the Triennale in Milan, two exhibits explore how the living material could be used in architecture.
The idea seems futuristic: At ETH Zurich, various disciplines are working together to combine conventional materials with bacteria, algae and fungi. The common goal: to create living materials that acquire useful properties thanks to the metabolism of microorganisms – “such as the ability to bind CO2 from the air by means of photosynthesis,” says Mark Tibbitt, Professor of Macromolecular Engineering at ETH Zurich.
An interdisciplinary research team led by Tibbitt has now turned this vision into reality: it has stably incorporated photosynthetic bacteria – known as cyanobacteria – into a printable gel and developed a material that is alive, grows and actively removes carbon from the air. The researchers recently presented their “photosynthetic living material” in a study in the journal Nature Communications.
Key characteristic: Dual carbon sequestration
The material can be shaped using 3D printing and only requires sunlight and artificial seawater with readily available nutrients in addition to CO2 to grow. “As a building material, it could help to store CO2 directly in buildings in the future,” says Tibbitt, who co-initiated the research into living materials at ETH Zurich.
The special thing about it: the living material absorbs much more CO2 than it binds through organic growth. “This is because the material can store carbon not only in biomass, but also in the form of minerals – a special property of these cyanobacteria,” reveals Tibbitt.
Yifan Cui, one of the two lead authors of the study, explains: “Cyanobacteria are among the oldest life forms in the world. They are highly efficient at photosynthesis and can utilise even the weakest light to produce biomass from CO2 and water”.
At the same time, the bacteria change their chemical environment outside the cell as a result of photosynthesis, so that solid carbonates (such as lime) precipitate. These minerals represent an additional carbon sink and – in contrast to biomass – store CO2 in a more stable form.
Cyanobacteria as master builders
“We utilise this ability specifically in our material,” says Cui, who is a doctoral student in Tibbitt’s research group. A practical side effect: the minerals are deposited inside the material and reinforce it mechanically. In this way, the cyanobacteria slowly harden the initially soft structures.
Laboratory tests showed that the material continuously binds CO₂ over a period of 400 days, most of it in mineral form – around 26 milligrams of CO2 per gram of material. This is significantly more than many biological approaches and comparable to the chemical mineralisation of recycled concrete (around 7 mg CO2 per gram).
Hydrogel as a habitat
The carrier material that harbours the living cells is a hydrogel – a gel made of cross-linked polymers with a high water content. Tibbitt’s team selected the polymer network so that it can transport light, CO2, water and nutrients and allows the cells to spread evenly inside without leaving the material.
To ensure that the cyanobacteria live as long as possible and remain efficient, the researchers have also optimised the geometry of the structures using 3D printing processes to increase the surface area, increase light penetration and promote the flow of nutrients.
Co-first author Dalia Dranseike: “In this way, we created structures that enable light penetration and passively distribute nutrient fluid throughout the body by capillary forces.” Thanks to this design, the encapsulated cyanobacteria lived productively for more than a year, the materials researcher in Tibbitt’s team is pleased to report.
Infrastructure as a carbon sink
The researchers see their living material as a low-energy and environmentally friendly approach that can bind CO2 from the atmosphere and supplement existing chemical processes for carbon sequestration. “In the future, we want to investigate how the material can be used as a coating for building façades to bind CO2 throughout the entire life cycle of a building,” Tibbitt looks ahead.
There is still a long way to go – but colleagues from the field of architecture have already taken up the concept and realised initial interpretations in an experimental way.
Two installations in Venice and Milan
Thanks to ETH doctoral student Andrea Shin Ling, basic research from the ETH laboratories has made it onto the big stage at the Architecture Biennale in Venice. “It was particularly challenging to scale up the production process from laboratory format to room dimensions,” says the architect and bio-designer, who is also involved in this study.
Ling is doing her doctorate at ETH Professor Benjamin Dillenburger’s Chair of Digital Building Technologies [sic]. In her dissertation, she developed a platform for biofabrication that can print living structures containing functional cyanobacteria on an architectural scale.
For the Picoplanktonics installation in the Canada Pavilion, the project team used the printed structures as living building blocks to construct two tree-trunk-like objects, the largest around three metres high. Thanks to the cyanobacteria, these can each bind up to 18 kg of CO2 per year – about as much as a 20-year-old pine tree in the temperate zone.
“The installation is an experiment – we have adapted the Canada Pavilion so that it provides enough light, humidity and warmth for the cyanobacteria to thrive and then we watch how they behave,” says Ling. This is a commitment: The team monitors and maintains the installation on site – daily. Until 23 November [2025].
At the 24th Triennale di Milano, Dafne’s Skin is investigating the potential of living materials for future building envelopes. On a structure covered with wooden shingles, microorganisms form a deep green patina that changes the wood over time: A sign of decay becomes an active design element that binds CO2 and emphasises the aesthetics of microbial processes. Dafne’s Skin is a collaboration between MAEID Studio and Dalia Dranseike. It is part of the exhibition “We the Bacteria: Notes Toward Biotic Architecture” and runs until 9 November [2025].
The photosynthetic living material was created thanks to an interdisciplinary collaboration within the framework of ALIVE (Advanced Engineering with Living Materials). The ETH Zurich initiative promotes collaboration between researchers from different disciplines in order to develop new living materials for a wide range of applications.
Before exploring the Canadian connection a little further, here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,
Dual carbon sequestration with photosynthetic living materials by Dalia Dranseike, Yifan Cui, Andrea S. Ling, Felix Donat, Stéphane Bernhard, Margherita Bernero, Akhil Areeckal, Marco Lazic, Xiao-Hua Qin, John S. Oakey, Benjamin Dillenburger, André R. Studart & Mark W. Tibbitt. Nature Communications volume 16, Article number: 3832 (2025) DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-58761-y Published: 23 April 2025
On the occasion of Canada’s participation in the 19th International Architecture Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, the Canada Council for the Arts present Picoplanktonics at the Canada Pavilion, from May 10 to November 23, 2025.
Amidst the ongoing global climate crisis, the Living Room Collective has developed a ground-breaking exhibition that showcases the potential for collaboration between humans and nature. Comprised of 3D printed structures that contain live cyanobacteria capable of carbon sequestration, Picoplanktonics is an exploration of our potential to co-operate with living systems by co-constructing spaces that remediate the planet rather than exploit it.
The Living Room Collective’s exhibition is the culmination of four years of collaborative research by Andrea Shin Ling and various interdisciplinary contributors. It is focused on harnessing the design principles of living systems to develop sustainable, intelligent and resilient materials and technologies for the future. By leveraging ancient biological processes alongside emergent technologies, it proposes designing environments under an ecology-first ethos.
“The Canada Council for the Arts is delighted to unveil Picoplanktonics by the Living Room Collective at the 19th International Architecture Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia. Through the lens of architecture, this year’s Canadian exhibition brings technological innovation and ecological stewardship together. It is a unique exhibition, sure to inspire global audiences and to ignite important conversations, about how our built environment might better house and use natural systems for a more sustainable future.”
– Michelle Chawla, Director and CEO, Canada Council for the Arts
When visitors enter the Canada Pavilion, they will encounter 3D printed structures that were originally fabricated in an ETH Zürich laboratory. These are the largest living material structures produced using a first-of-its-kind biofabrication platform capable of printing living structures at an architectural scale. The unique Picoplanktonics experience stems from adapting the Canada Pavilion to provide enough light, moisture, and warmth for the living cyanobacteria within the structures to grow, thrive and change. For the duration of the exhibition, caretakers will be onsite tending to the structures, emphasizing care and stewardship as essential elements of the design.
As global carbon emissions continue to rise to untenable levels, Picoplanktonics presents a vision of how a regenerative system of construction could operate. It is an ongoing experiment centered on leveraging the reciprocal relationship between living structures, the built environment, and humans. In this way, the Living Room Collective is rethinking building principles and prioritizing ecological resilience beyond human species survival.
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“Picoplanktonics marks four years of research at ETH Zürich with international collaborators in material science, biology, robotics, and computational design. As we move these living prototypes into the Canada Pavilion, we are thrilled to invite the public into this open experiment and reveal all phases of the material’s life, including growth, sickness, and death, while collectively imagining a regenerative design approach that seeks planetary remediation.”
–Andrea Shin Ling, The Living Room Collective
The Living Room Collective
The Living Room Collective is a group of architects, scientists, artists and educators who work at the intersection of architecture, biology and digital fabrication technologies—led by Canadian architect and biodesigner Andrea Shin Ling. Alongside core team members Nicholas Hoban, Vincent Hui and Clayton Lee, the collective seeks to move society away from exploitative systems of production to regenerative ones by inventing design methods and processes that center on natural systems.
They see the Biennale Architettura 2025 as a platform to generate national and international conversations that ask: How does one fabricate a biological architecture? What are the conditions of stewardship? What are the strategies to instigate this at scale, regionally and globally?
Andrea Shin Ling is an architect and biodesigner who works at the intersection of design, digital fabrication and biology. Her work focuses on how the critical application of biologically and computationally mediated design processes can move society away from exploitative systems of production to regenerative ones. She is the 2020 S+T+ARTS Grand Prize winner for her work as Ginkgo Bioworks’ creative resident designing the decay of artifacts in order to access material circularity. Andrea is a founder of designGUILD, a Toronto-based art collective, and was a researcher in the Mediated Matter group at the MIT Media Lab, where she worked on AguahojaI, a 3D-printed bio-material pavilion. She is currently a doctoral fellow at the Chair of Digital Building Technologies at ETH Zurich.
Nicholas Hoban is a computational designer, fabricator and educator. He works at the intersection of computational design, robotics, construction and simulation in pedagogy, research and practice. Nicholas is the director of applied technologies at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture [University of Toronto], Landscape, and Design and a lecturer within the Daniels technology specialist program, leading various research and teaching labs while developing curriculum for studios and seminars on advanced fabrication and robotics within architecture. His research focuses on the application of robotics within fabrication and construction and on how we can solve critical problems in geometry through integrated processes. Nicholas was a lead fabricator and computational designer for two previous Venice Biennales: for the 2014 Canadian Pavilion for Lateral Office’s Arctic Adaptations and for the 2016 Swiss Pavilion for Christian Kerez’s Incidental Space.
Vincent Hui is a distinguished professor at Toronto Metropolitan University’s Department of Architectural Science, imparting knowledge across diverse domains from design studios to digital tools. His pedagogical excellence has earned him multiple teaching accolades, as he delves into the intersections of architecture, fabrication and allied disciplines. With over 25 years of experience, his extensive publication portfolio focuses on design pedagogy, simulation, prototyping and technological convergence, complemented by a rich body of creative work showcased globally. Collaborating with esteemed organizations such as the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC), the Ontario Association of Architects (OAA) and the Canadian Architecture Students’ Association (CASA), Vincent endeavours to empower the next generation of designers, navigating emergent shifts in praxis. Committed to bridging academia and industry, he advocates for experiential learning initiatives and outreach endeavours for aspiring designers. His remarkable contributions have culminated in his induction into the esteemed RAIC College of Fellows.
Clayton Lee is a curator, producer and performance artist. He is currently the director (artistic) of the Fierce Festival, in Birmingham, UK. He was previously the director of the Rhubarb Festival, Canada’s longest-running festival of new and experimental performance, at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre. Clayton has also worked as creative producer on Jess Dobkin’s projects, including For What It’s Worth, her commission at the Wellcome Collection, in London, UK; as curatorial associate at the Luminato Festival; and as managing producer of the CanadaHub at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. His performance projects have been presented in venues across Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom and New Zealand. He was one of the Art Gallery of Ontario’s 2023 artists-in-residence.
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There are still a few months left if you want to attend. Bon Voyage!
