From - Tue Jan 20 23:22:41 1998
From: Dewey Murdick <murdick@andrews.edu>
To: physclub@andrews.edu
Subject: Look what I learned!!

Howdy All!

This week's learning adventure/distraction was inspired by Tonya
McFadden when she used a new word that I had never heard before–
tensegrity.

Tensegrity is a contraction of tensional integrity.  It was originally
coined by R. Buckminster Fuller's Synergetics, ~1975.  Check

http://www.servtech.com/public/rwgray/synergetics/synergetics.html

for an online edition.

The concept is a wholistic (system wide) perspective and is of
particular (applied) interest to engineers as well as
structural/molecular biologists.  It seems to be based in the
understanding of energy, compression and tension.  Tensegrity
structures, like the geodesic dome, are structures that minimize
torque.  The destructive torque generated by a horizontal shearing
forces is applied above the anchoring point (like the foundation of a
house).  "The walls act as levers, creating torque, the house deals with
the stress by destroying itself."  Tensegrity structures distribute the
stress like pneumatic structures (a football, for example) and thus the
stressed point doesn't destruct so rapidly.

Fuller claims that all natural structures, "properly understood," are
tensegrity structures.  "Universe is omnitensional integrity. ... from
the atom to the solar system."

Recently molecular biologists have picked up on the idea and have been
working on cells as tensegrity structures.  Dr. Stephen Levin, an
orthopedic surgeon in Vienna, Virginia has proposed that the body
actually functions as an entire unit, and cannot be "seen" by "taking it
apart."  This sounds a lot like the irreducibly complex issues that Behe
brought out.  (That is my connection.)  Molecular Geodesics, Inc. is
working on biomimetic materials that "mimic the micro structural
organization, mechanical responsiveness, and solid-phase biocatalytic
activities of living cells and tissues."

The whole area looks nifty and worth exploration.  It is a neat
perspective from which to look at rather complex problems.  Tensegrity
seems to have much in common with Chaos theory and is applied by many
the same people.  It is the big picture approach to very interesting
problems.

Buckminster Fuller is also an interesting study.  He delt with many
"global problems facing humanity" long before the became a centerpiece
of disccusion.  You can read more about him at

http://www.swifty.com/apase/charlotte/@U104.html

-->for futher study
Ingber, Donald E. _Scientific American_ January 1998.  "The Architecture
of Life"
http://www.frontiernet.net/~imaging/tenseg1.html
http://www.molec-geodesics.com/
http://www.im3.inserm.fr/u296/equipe1UK.html
http://www.kin.ucalgary.ca/isb/biomch-l.archives/log9411/00132.html
(Search for tensegrity)
http://www.servtech.com/public/rwgray.synergetics/synergetics.html
Dr. Levin – write me for the address.

Have fun!

Dewey (the younger)