Spotted: Sustainably strengthening economies and agriculture is foundational to the attainment of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). But climate change is putting increasing pressure on agriculture – with fluctuating seasons, changing rainfall patterns, extreme weather, and drought all becoming more common. Now, French agrobiotechnology company Elicit Plant uses plant-derived molecules called phytosterols to help crops survive dry periods.
Phytosterols are lipids that activate a plant’s resistance to environmental stressors. The compound is applied to plants early in their growth to encourage the development of characteristics that maximise the efficiency of water use.
Longer roots combined with reduced evapotranspiration help global cereal crops such as soybean and corn better survive the increasingly challenging environments within a changing climate. Elicit Plant’s trials show an increase in yield of between 13 and 22 per cent per crop, with a monetary value increase of up to $240 (around €219) per hectare.
The company’s first product is called BEST-a and is designed for soybeans. It can be used on corn, too, although a compound specifically for corn is nearing availability. As well as waiting for the final regulatory approvals, the company is also developing additional products to expand the range of crops it supports. BEST-a not only helps farmers grow more in drier conditions, the product also makes it possible to stretch available water supplies over a longer period of time.
Innovations that help farmers grow enough food for the world’s expanding population are crucial. Some that Springwise has spotted include urine-based fertilisers and sensors that optimise water usage for crops.
Spotted: The World Health Organization (WHO) identifies antibiotic resistance as one of today’s biggest threats to global health, food security, and development. One way to reduce the need for antibiotics is to lessen the number of infections requiring additional care. With a lot of outpatient healthcare resources spent on wound treatment, a reduction in the rate of infection would drastically affect the amount of antibiotics prescribed.
A team of Linköping University researchers, in collaboration with colleagues from Örebro and Luleå Universities, has created a new material that helps reduce infections in healing wounds. Traditionally, healthcare workers lift a dressing to visually evaluate the healing process. With each exposure, there is an increased risk of infection. Continual disturbance of the wound also slows the healing process.
The new material is a tight mesh made of nanocellulose that allows gases and liquids through. Loaded onto the material is a nanoscale silica compound containing bromthymol blue dye. The dye reacts to a pH level of more than seven by turning from yellow to blue. Non-infected wounds have a pH level of approximately 5.5, meaning that any increase will begin to cause a reaction in the dressing.
As the dressing changes colour, healthcare teams can consider treatments far earlier than if they had to wait for a full-blown infection to develop. Because the dressing allows air to pass through, it is designed to stay on the wound during the entire healing process. In a best-case scenario, a patient wouldn’t ever have to change the dressing, meaning that wounds could heal faster because the scabbing process is never disturbed.
The flexible material is ideal for use in hard-to-reach and hard-to-bandage areas of the body. Alongside the dressing, the researchers are also developing anti-microbial substances to further strengthen the dressings. The dressing could be available in five to ten years, depending on the speed with which it can pass through the required healthcare regulatory checks.
Smart bandages are being tested out in a multitude of ways, with Springwise spotting innovations that include a dressing that releases antibiotics when bacteria are detected and a bandage that glows when an infection develops.
Climate network Architects Declare has failed to live up to its ambitions and now represents a cautionary tale about setting sustainability commitments, writes Chris Hocknell.
After all the press releases, announcements, and LinkedIn posts it has become clear that four years on from its launch, Architects Declare is collecting dust. Speaking from experience of working with hundreds of architecture firms, I can tell you that the number that have loudly signed up to the climate network and yet are demonstrably not implementing or even properly advocating its agenda on live projects is startlingly high.
The so-called green transition is the most important industrial issue of our generation. When crucial climate-target commitments slowly die, so do our chances of decarbonising our economies. The failure of Architects Declare shows us that for true progress to be made we need realistic, achievable and accountable target-setting processes that cut across industries.
What emerged as a positive movement appears to have become a damp squib
Architects Declare certainly made waves when it was established as the UK architecture industry’s response to the climate crisis in May 2019. Among many similar networks emerging across sectors, it was particularly high-profile and ambitious. Sustainability specialists were impressed, if a little sceptical at its scale and boldness.
Its lofty aims included commitments to “establish climate and biodiversity mitigation principles as the key measure of our industry’s success: demonstrated through awards, prizes, and listings” and to “advocate for faster change in the industry towards regenerative design practices and a higher government funding priority to support this”.
We were embedded in Architects Declare from the beginning, hosting an event where we encouraged studios to get involved and offering surgeries for technical queries about achieving the aims. But after that much-heralded birth, what emerged as a positive movement combining some of the key players in the industry appears to have become a damp squib.
Some saw the high-profile departures of Zaha Hadid Architects and Foster + Partners from Architects Declare amid a row over their work on airports as evidence of signatories failing to honour their commitments.
But I believe that for true progress to be made in decarbonising the entire economy, companies need to collaborate across sectors instead of refusing to work on airports and other infrastructure projects haphazardly deemed to be high carbon. Practices like Zaha and Fosters should proudly work with these projects. Airports aren’t going away, so we need architecture firms to work alongside them and get them ready for low- or zero-carbon operation in the coming years.
Far more concerning are the countless firms that have waxed lyrical about their “bold new ambitions” and commitment to Architects Declare online while quietly continuing with business as usual.
Many of the commitments included within declarations often simply fall outside of an architecture firm’s direct control, dependent on clients further up the food chain. Architects know this well, as it’s the first reason they give you if you ask them whether they’re honouring their Architects Declare commitment (try it at your next design team meeting).
Failing to meet targets undermines faith and discourages others from taking collective action
For example, the ambition to “include life-cycle costing, whole-life carbon modelling, and post-occupancy evaluation as part of the basic scope of work, to reduce both embodied and operational resource use” requires a specialist appointment and the inclination to utilise these disciplines into the project.
Especially for post-occupancy evaluation, which occurs after the development has been completed and potentially sold, and there will be no architecture firm involved. Achieving these commitments requires the engagement of developers, specialist designers and managers.
Similar is the commitment to “accelerate the shift to low embodied carbon materials in all work”. It is certainly true that progressively shifting specifications towards lower embodied carbon materials can reduce the carbon footprint of the construction industry significantly over time, as well as driving desperately needed innovation in the development of new, low-carbon materials and processes.
However, a non-trivial number of material specifications and construction systems are not made by architectural companies, and architects make that point abundantly clear when asked about the low-carbon material commitment.
Signatories may well argue that government inaction is the root cause for the programme’s stalling. Architects Declare sought government funding to support the shift to “regenerative design practices”. Yet we must understand that ultimately it is developers who build, not governments.
Governments simply cannot regulate net-zero into existence. While next-generation, low-carbon materials are in development, they are not yet commercially available. Many developed nations still suffer from a housing and infrastructure shortage, and mandating low-carbon buildings without the supply side of the equation would only exacerbate this crisis. It is not reasonable to simultaneously masquerade as an agent of change whilst passing the buck to the government. Decarbonisation is, and will always be, a symbiotic effort between the public and private sector with each actor playing their own part.
Here lies a cautionary tale for climate commitments, especially in the run-up to the controversial COP28 conference. While bold and splashy commitments may make for impressive LinkedIn posts, failing to meet those targets undermines faith in the power of commitments and discourages others from taking the collective action required to effect real change.
My lessons would be as follows: climate commitments must be realistic and actionable. Honest introspection about one’s capacities should be a precursor to setting bold targets. Many of the ambitions set out by Architects Declare are simply too big for architects alone to achieve. If Architects Declare was really intended to be a lobbying group or awareness-raising campaign with actions optional, then that should have been made clear from the off.
The architecture profession now stands out by the breadth of the shortfall between its words and its actions
As it is, the architecture profession now stands out by the breadth of the shortfall between its words and its actions. From my experience the average company in other construction professions are also only partially active in terms of sustainability, but they have not set out such ambitious targets and been so vocal about their commitment and devotion to the cause. This is not necessarily a question of the level of action per se, it’s about making big claims and failing to live up to them.
When it comes to climate-target setting, no commitment is often better than a failed one. Every empty climate pledge only erodes public trust in commitments, adding to a growing sense of fatigue, apathy, and helplessness in achieving a sustainable future. Sustainability is a marathon, not a sprint. It’s better to repeatedly achieve small carbon reductions from multiple compounding, unsexy, and hard-won optimisations than to make lofty promises that rely on the good graces of an aloof and unknown party.
The hollowness of Architects Declare should serve as a warning to the industry. To avoid eroding public trust and accusations of greenwashing, bold promises require concrete action. Otherwise, we may soon find ourselves asking: “what’s the point?”.
Chris Hocknell is director of UK sustainability consultancy Eight Versa.
Spotted: Less than 45 per cent of original global reefs remain, and scientists predict that by 2070, they could disappear altogether. Reefs are declining at twice the pace of rainforests and stopping the damage requires swift, focused actions at sites around the world. One company, Swiss-based Rrreefs, creates bespoke coral reef replacements that provide multiple environmental benefits. The company’s goal is to revive one per cent of coastal coral reefs by 2033.
Using pure clay, the company 3D prints reef bricks that are customised to best suit the nearest shoreline and local environment. By understanding water flows and marine topography, the company builds structures that provide microenvironments for thousands of animals and plants to thrive. Protecting shores from erosion improves the growing environments for underwater forests of mangroves and seagrass, both of which are crucial to the capture of carbon dioxide. And a single cubic metre of the reef blocks provides a new home to more than 20,000 tiny animals, 20 corals, 60 fish, and more.
The surface of the bricks is designed specifically to support a variety of coral larvae contributing to the genetic diversity of the new reef. The natural clay material contains no artificial ingredients or chemicals, making it a healthy choice that contributes no new pollution to the world’s oceans.
Using 3D printing allows for modular production and complete customisation of height, width, and length of the overall reef structure. The process also allows for local manufacturing, which further reduces the carbon footprint of each reef.
The innovations seeking to help stop the irreversible destruction of the world’s coral reefs are many and varied. Recent ones spotted by Springwise include a global cat food brand supporting new reefs and a company making leather out of an invasive fish that threatens reef health.
Spotted: Global scholarship in many fields has been growing for years, with more researchers and scientists publishing larger numbers of articles. Trying to stay on top of the latest findings is a difficult job, even for someone immersed in a field. New company Consensus is using artificial intelligence (AI) to reduce the time burden of searching for the latest information.
An AI-powered search engine, Consensus’ platform reads peer-reviewed articles to find research that addresses a users’ query. Search results are ranked according to their relevance to the query and quality of answers found. The Consensus team reminds users that the AI is trained on scholarly publications and is therefore not a general search engine that provides answers to basic facts.
Currently in beta format, users must set up an account to use the platform. Consensus provides an online best practice guide that includes suggestions for phrasing questions. The company also provides examples of search terms that return more limited results and explains the reasons why.
The platform is constantly improving, and the Consensus team lists a few of the ways in which they are actively working to strengthen results, including broadening the AI’s understanding of text formatting in scientific papers and increasing the AI’s contextual understanding of a sentence.
Academic publishing is complex, and technology is providing researchers with a range of new tools to help work more efficiently. Springwise has spotted a browser extension that automates citations and an algorithm that evaluates new research for its business potential.
Spotted: As innovators create new sustainable fibres, the options available to those working in the fashion industry are expanding, making it easier to design and produce products with lower carbon footprints. The new fabrics are exciting, bringing with them increased options and challenges for designers. Additionally, many of the companies behind the latest offerings have broader social goals embedded into their working philosophy.
Uganda’s Mawejje Creations, for instance, is a socially minded company that produces textiles made from waste banana plants, fabric offcuts, secondhand clothes, and organic cotton. The business’s Commune Fabric is made for use in fashion and consists entirely of banana crop biowaste. Much like hemp, when grown as part of a sustainable, mixed agricultural crop, the banana plant requires little to no maintenance, making it an excellent replacement for water-heavy cotton crops.
Easily grown in Uganda, the banana plant requires no fertiliser or pesticides, and the production process of the fibres ensures that the final fabric is chemical-free. Mawejje Creations also trains young people in the fabric production process and encourages local farmers to use sustainable methods for the highest quality plants. Importantly, part of the training process includes learning certain styles of weaving as a means of preserving and passing along some of the area’s heritage skills.
The banana plant is proving to be extremely useful, with Springwise spotting innovations that include leather made from banana fibre and a banana-based growth enhancer being used to reduce chemical use in industrial production processes.
Dezeen Showroom: sustainability-focused Italian furniture brand One to One has launched the OTO chair, designed by Alessandro Stabile and Martinelli Venezia to be a “manifesto of circular design”.
Stabile and Venezia created the recycled plastic OTO chair with the goal of achieving full sustainability, not just in material choices but in the supply chain.
The OTO chair is made with sustainability at its core
“From the beginning, we realised that using recycled materials was not enough,” said Stabile and Venezia. “We had to think about something that would systematise the entire sustainable supply chain, from production to logistics, distribution and assembly, to stimulate the public with a product capable of activating a new awareness.”
The resulting OTO chair is produced using a single mould, and it is sold online and delivered direct to consumers flatpacked.
It comes in a choice of six colours
In the making of OTO, One to One collaborated with Ogyre — which runs the Fishing for Litter platform, allowing any fisherman to contribute to collecting marine waste for reuse. Each OTO chair removes 500 grams of plastic from the sea, according to the brand.
The OTO chair comes in six colours: onyx, fog, mustard, eucalyptus, coral and forest.
Dezeen Showroom offers an affordable space for brands to launch new products and showcase their designers and projects to Dezeen’s huge global audience. For more details email [email protected].
Dezeen Showroom is an example of partnership content on Dezeen. Find out more about partnership content here.
Spotted: In 2020, 4.8 tonnes of waste were generated per inhabitant in the European Union, and the volume of waste we generate as a global – and increasingly consumer – population is only growing. Recycling rates are not keeping up with current rates of waste production, with a lot of waste ending up either incinerated or dumped in landfill. To help end this unsustainable waste treatment, Netherlands-based startup Seenons has created a platform that connects everyone in the waste chain to help reduce rubbish, salvage valuable raw materials, and stimulate a circular economy.
Seenons combines clean technology and smart logistics in its tech platform, connecting organisations that separate waste, logistics companies that transport it, and processors and producers who use the scraps to manufacture new usable materials and products. The platform matches waste with a suitable processor, who then turns it into a new product, green electricity, or biogas. For example, coffee residues can be repurposed into soap, or used as raw material to grow oyster mushrooms.
Seenons’ website and app allow businesses to arrange for their waste to be collected efficiently and sustainably with the click of a button. Users can manage and track their waste easily with Seenons and see the positive impact they’ve made in a personalised dashboard.
The company recently raised €10 million in a recent investment round, which will be used to further develop its platform internationally and improve its technology.
Springwise has spotted many innovations that better manage waste, including houses that are made using waste from rice production, and an app that helps families minimise the food that ends up in kitchen bins.
Design gallerist and curator Rossana Orlandi has announced the winners of this year’s Ro Plastic Prize for sustainable material use during a ceremony at Milan design week.
The Ro Plastic Prize is awarded yearly to projects that feature material recycling, reuse or upcycling, with this year’s winning projects including a bacteria-growing menstrual cup and a 3D-printed prosthetic leg.
Italian company Isinnova won in the Emerging High Technology category with its design for an artificial leg, which was designed to be produced quickly and at a low cost in emergency situations such as wars and earthquakes.
A bacteria-growing menstrual cup (top) and a 3D-printed prosthetic leg (above) are among the winners of the 2023 Ro Plastic Prize
This is crucial because, without the rapid provision of a prosthesis, a patient’s chances of being able to walk again are decreased due to factors such as muscle atrophy, according to Isinnova CEO Cristian Fracassi.
Made largely from recycled plastic that is 3D-printed to customised designs, the prosthetic was developed in response to the war in Ukraine and is being made on a not-for-profit basis.
There were two winners in the Art and Collectible Design category: designer Geo Minelli with the Kernel tables and architecture studio External Reference with its Pure Plants collection, both from Italy.
THE Kernel table was one of two winners in the Art and Collectible Design category
Minelli’s Kernel tables are made by recycling end-of-life wind turbines made from glass fibre-reinforced plastic into a new circular material called Glebanite.
The tables, which have a smooth top and a gnarled trunk-like base, are the result of two years worth of experimentation with the material’s textures, colours and fabrication techniques.
External Reference’s Pure Plants are artificial plants that are 3D-printed from a corn-based bioplastic called Pure.Tech and available in 17 different “species”, each with an intricate geometry based on phyllotactic leaf patterns.
Another Art and Collectible Design winner was Pure Plants
There were also two winners in the Inspiring Learning Projects category.
Czech designer Adriana Kováčová was recognised for her recycled plastic Totemo toy, which evolves from a mobile hanger to a construction set, and Italian design studio Cantieri Creativi was awarded for its Artisans Of Now workshop series, held in locations around Italy and focused on reconnecting people with nature and craft.
Adriana Kováčová’s Totemo won in the Inspiring Learning Projects category
Among the runners-up and special mentions in the competition was Italian designer Lucrezia Alessandroni, whose Soothing Cup is a speculative project comprising a menstrual cup and incubator that would enable users to grow vaginal bacteria extracted from their own body with the goal of reducing period pain.
A seaweed-based hydrogel turns the silicone cup into a bio-membrane that can collect vaginal lactobacillus bacteria, which is then cultivated in an incubator in the time between periods.
The OTO chair by Alessandro Stabile and Martinelli is made of recycled ocean plastic
According to Alessandroni, studies have shown that this bacteria can reduce period pain and cut down on the number of painkillers those affected have to take each month.
Another special mention in the Emerging High Technology category went to Italian designers Alessandro Stabile and Martinelli for the OTO chair, which is made from recycled ocean plastic in a single, reduced-size mould and shipped flat-packed direct to consumers.
In the Art and Collectible design category, special mentions included UK design studio Novavita’s recycled plastic tiles, which have a mottled patterning that is meant to recall natural stone and marble.
And Spanish duo Eneris Collective made third place in the Inspiring Learning Projects category with its playful design for the Nontalo children’s stool, made from waste olive pits.
The shortlisted projects were exhibited as part of Milan design week
Shortlisted projects for the Ro Plastic Prize were on display as part of an exhibition at Milan design week. And winners were announced on 20 April after judging by a 17-member jury that included Triennale Milano president Stefano Boeri, architect and designer Giulio Cappellini, Parley for the Oceans founder Cyrill Gutsch and Dezeen co-CEO Benedict Hobson.
The prize is an initiative by Orlandi and her daughter Nicoletta Orlandi Brugnoni, who wanted to raise awareness around the importance of plastic recycling and reuse.
Since the first Ro Plastic Prize in 2019, the criteria of the competition has expanded to include other plastic alternatives, with competition categories varying every year.
The Ro Plastic Prize exhibition was on show as part of Milan design week, which took place from 18 to 23 April. See our Milan design week 2023 guide on Dezeen Events Guide for information about the many other exhibitions, installations and talks that took place throughout the week.
The world now has vaccines for more than 20 different life-threatening diseases. And according to the World Health Organization (WHO), immunisation prevents between 3.5 million and 5 million deaths from illnesses such as tetanus, diphtheria, measles and influenza, each and every year.
The coronavirus pandemic has further proven the value of vaccines, with 19.8 million deaths estimated to have been averted in the first year of global COVID-19 vaccination programmes.
But while immunisation has been a success story in world health, there is still a lot of work to do, and new technology is constantly under development.
For example, while the COVID-19 vaccination programme has been successful, the broader disruptions caused by the pandemic have led to a fall in coverage for other diseases, with an estimated 25 million children under the age of 1 year not receiving basic vaccines in 2021 – the highest number since 2009.
This pandemic-driven setback has inspired the theme for World Immunization Week 2023: ‘The Big Catch-Up.’ World Immunization Week is celebrated in the last week of April each year, and the WHO-backed event aims to highlight the collective action needed to protect people through vaccinations.
To celebrate the event, we highlight some of the most cutting-edge vaccine technologies, as well as other innovations improving access to vaccines around the world.
Many people around the world have a phobia of needles, which makes the prospect of a vaccine jab daunting. But what if there was another way to deliver vaccines – one that doesn’t involve needles? Today, there are several startups exploring this possibility. Among them is Vaxxas, a company that has developed a patch that contains thousands of vaccine-coated microprojections. This patch is applied to the skin for a few seconds to deliver a dose of vaccine, and the company claims that this technology is not only needle-free but can enhance a vaccine’s performance. This is because the patch delivers the vaccine directly to the high concentration of immune cells immediately beneath the skin, while sounding the immune system’s ‘alarm bells’ so that the vaccine’s components are quickly transported to the lymph nodes. Vaxxas currently has patches for COVID-19 and seasonal flu undergoing stage I clinical trials. Find out more
Photo credit: Ryan Allen from Second Bay Studios
Vaxxas is not the only company working to deliver vaccines through patches. In fact, microneedle patches are in development for many diseases including measles, polio, and rubella. And now, researchers at MIT have developed a way to leverage this technology to get vaccines to more people, including in hard-to-reach areas. Their solution: mobile printers that can produce hundreds of vaccine patches per day. The printers fit onto a table top and can be transported anywhere around the world – wherever vaccines are needed. The ability to produce vaccines on demand could resolve a key poblem impacting vaccine roll-outs. Vaccines need to be stored at cold temperatures, meaning they are difficult to transport and stockpile. But instead of shipping around vaccine doses, the new mobile printers could be sent to locations like refugee camps or remote villages in response to disease outbreaks. Find out more
Like all organisms, pathogens – microbes that cause disease – are constantly evolving. And because most vaccines today are designed to target a particular part of a pathogen, this can make vaccines ineffective, sometimes after a short period of time. To tackle this, startup Baseimmune deploys deep learning to predict the direction in which pathogens are likely to evolve. This enables the company to create vaccines that stay ahead of the evolutionary curve. Using the algorithm-crunched data, Baseimmune creates ‘pick and mix’ antigens – substances that cause your immune system to create antibodies – that target multiple parts of a pathogen. This gives the immune system all the tools it needs to recognise and protect against a pathogen – even as it evolves. Today, the company’s pipeline includes vaccines for African Swine Fever, COVID-19, and Malaria, all of which are in the preclinical stage of development. Find out more
To be effective, vaccines rely on the human immune system recognising foreign proteins called antigens. These antigens are harmless, but they induce the body to react as it would to the presence of a pathogen, prompting it to create specific antibodies that will be effective against an actual disease. One of the best ways to introduce antigens to the body is to bind them to a harmless virus-like particle. This approach creates a very strong immune response, but it is difficult to create these bonds in a reliable and controlled way. This is where startup SpyBiotech comes in. The company takes a protein from a species of bacteria and splits it in two. Half of the bacteria protein binds to the virus-like particle and half to the antigen. The two halves are then joined back together in a covalent bond that acts like molecular ‘superglue’. As a result, the virus-like particle can be fully covered in antigens to create effective vaccines. The technology can be adjusted to work with a range of different vaccine candidates. The company’s current focus is on a vaccine candidate for Human Cytomegalovirus, which is due to enter phase I trials in 2023. Find out more
In the hit TV show The Last of Us the world is inflicted by a deadly fungal infection, modelled – with some creative licence – on the cordyceps fungus. While the show is fiction – and fungal infections do not turn people into staggering zombies – fungal infections are responsible for around 1.5 million deaths each year, mostly in people with suppressed immune systems. As the show notes, there is currently no vaccine for fungal infections, but a team at the University of Georgia is looking to change this. The researchers’ have designed a vaccine candidate that is designed to shield against the three most common causes of fungal infections: Aspergillus, Candida, and Pneumocystis. Together, these three types of fungus are responsible for more than 80 per cent of fungal fatalities. The vaccine uses the KEX1 peptide – a short chain of amino acids – which can disrupt fungal growth. In animal trials, the vaccine showed “broad, cross-protective antifungal immunity,” and there are plans to move forward to phase I trials. Read more
Written By: Matthew Hempstead
For more innovations, head to the Springwise Innovation Library.
