microplexes - very small complex systems can show us how to grow large urban systems

8/8/2019 Microplexes - Very Small Complex Systems Can Show Us How to Grow Large Urban Systems

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The cell biologist and the ecologist will tell you that they work in different fields of the same

branch of knowledge, invoking the kind of tree taxonomy of knowledge sketched by Diderot in

the 18th Century.

Fig. 2 Tree taxonomy of knowledge from Diderot’s 18th Century Encyclopédie. Knowledge is structured into memory,

reason, imagination.

[ source ]



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-world netw

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pithelial cell ne

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pithelial cell ne

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The probing we see here due to cell tip growth is a form of morphogenesis. The term

morphogenesis describes the various processes that result in the development of form in cellular

biological systems. Let’s look at more morphogenetic processes, because they can show us some

spatial outcomes of self-organisation.

Here’s one of the most fundamental, mitosis,

Fig. 18 Mitotic processes in a one-hour old fruit fly embryo imaged via confocal microscopy. A Histone protein is tagged

with a substance that allows us to track cell nuclei.

It is interesting to note that mitosis creates very dense but essentially decentralised

morphologies. We can say they’re decentralised because a centrality analysis of the network

representation will show us that no cell in the system is especially important from the point of

view of the global connectivity of the system. Cellular systems provide us with a good

demonstration of this fact, that high-density form is not the same as centralised form.

In this mesh topology, cell integration is not as good as that evinced in small-world networks,

because, as with the vascular bundle, long range shortcuts are not available. Note the

synchronisation of various phases of mitotic processes across all the cells.

Lastly here are epithelial ducts developing a complex network structure through a process known

as branching morphogenesis. This movie depicts a fragment of epithelium growing in a 3D gel of

extracellular matrix proteins. New ducts initiate, elongate, bifurcate, and stop. This

morphogenetic process underpins the fractal cardiovascular structures in our own bodies. It

creates self-similar, dendritic structures, a tree topology.

Fig. 19 Branching Morphogenesis in epithelial cells.

The Sabin & Jones architecture studio has examined the effects of branching morphogenesis in

endothelial cells and how the attractive forces between the cells deform the substrate, which is

modelled as an extra-cellular matrix, or ECM,

Fig. 20 Model showing ECM deformations produced by spontaneous network formation in enothelial cells, by Sabin &

Jones. [ source ]



My own

propose

pattern

Fig. 21 A

of Papilio

[ source ]

research in

d by Alan T

formation i

lan Turing’s re

Dardanus.

to morpho

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organism

action-diffusio

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lly been appli

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be blac

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gene exgenerat

Fig. 22 G

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or white a

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enerative mod

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activator a

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physics

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systems

left – th

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Fig. 27 A

see microc

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c will vary d

the Wester

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y aims is t

g Cities

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the top left,

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.

. [ source ]

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d out in ar

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64). [ source ]

hitecture in

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a huge sca

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chitectural

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is Cedri

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Fig. 29 C

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erator into

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n the 60s, a

ese ideas w London’s

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Fig. 30 T

1960. [ s

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ransport netwo

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, I’m using

describe gr

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French vill

[ source ]

that we are

, which can

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the dual uramics. Here

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ieu Helie’s co

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Fig. 36-4

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novel analysis and novel techniques for identifying low-cost reconfigurations of transport links

based on these insights.

I’ve touched on how creating generative growth models for cities that embrace self-organisation

through bottom-up policy rules, or generators, can provide insights into how to produce more

sustainable urban form. Even our cursory glance at cell biology gives us clear examples of very

dense yet decentralised spatial formations which allow for effective transport of nutrients

through porous structures and boundary diffusion. These kind of insights into density,

morphology and transport can contribute to the discourse on sustainable urban form and growth.

Lastly, I’ve introduced several concepts from morphogenetic systems, such as cells, gradients,

extra-cellular matrix, motility and morphogens, which are useful when talking about emergent

morphologies, a vocabulary that can be employed in the kind of urban growth models I am

working with.

Thank you.

See Also: Network , Infrastructure, Cybernetics, Emergence, Morphogenesis, Space Syntax

Bibliography

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1965)

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3 Peter Cook et al, Archigram (New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 1999)

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Design (Netherlands: Springer, 2006)

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Jersey: Wiley-Blackwell, 2002)

15 Bocaletti et al, Complex networks: Structure and Dynamics Elsevier, Physics Reports 424 (2006) 175 – 308

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17 Sporns et al, Organization, development and function of complex brain networks , Elsevier, TRENDS in Cognitive

Sciences Vol.8 No.9

18 Duncan J. Watts, Steven H. Strogatz, Collective Dynamics of Small World Networks , Nature, Vol. 393 (1998)

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No. 4 (2008)

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AA Publications, 2007)

22 Neil Leach, Digital Cities AD: Architectural Design (London: John Wiley & Sons, 2009)

Revised on October 4, 2010 20:23 by Anil Bawa-Cavia

microplexes - very small complex systems can show us how to grow large urban systems

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