Leen van Wijngaarden

Leen van Wijngaarden will present his work at fab*education!

 

Molecular City

All matter in our environment consists of small particles, molecules. The molecular world is the world of chemistry. The molecular world is a world of beauty, generally well appreciated by chemists. In order to demonstrate and share this world a walk is designed in which the chemical world behind everyday-objects is shown. All sorts of knowledge are explained during the walk. By using modern techniques like augmented reality and smart phone technology it is made possible to discover this world in 3D animations.

On different materials and objects tags are attached, with a text and a marker. The marker is a code to be recognized by a Smartphone camera, which will then show an animation superimposed over the real time image. Molecular structures of simple molecules like water can be easily visualized, as well as polymers, proteins, DNA etc. It might be possible to have short video clips.

 

Molecules come alive with this app …

Science LinX developed the Smartphone app ‘Molecular City’, with which you can bring molecules to live. During festivals and special occasions Science LinX provokes you to explore the markers … scan the markers with the camera of your Smartphone and discover the molecular world in 3D. As from the ‘beer’-molecule at the bar, through a urine molecule at the toilet. And they talk to you.

The app has been lounged in four languishes (German, English, Chinese and Dutch)

www.leenvanwijngaarden.nl  

www.rug.nl/sciencelinx/molecularcity/index 

Master class the beauty of mathematics 

Each year Science LinX (Groningen) organizes two days workshops for oncoming students for the university of Groningen. A broad variety of workshops are offered of which some are developed and organized in corporation with the FabLab. The FabLab is used as a high tech manufacturing workshop. Besides this, the knowledge of the FabLab community (creativity, art and technology), serves as a source of inspiration for the connection between the beta sciences and daily life.

In corporation of Jaap ter Reegen (Technacium), professor Jaap Top (university of Groningen), Leen van Wijngaarden (Fablab Groningen) developed a workshop for students on mathematics and 3D production.

After an introduction on the mathematics of stacked lines by Jaap Top, the students started programming in GeoGebra, an open source algebra program. Using a complex equation with three variables and linear curves, 2D shapes are created. The shapes are exported to the laser cutter and stacked. With this, the students produced a complex 3D shape starting with elementary mathematics of an equation and different parameters, through 2D shapes to the final model. 

www.leenvanwijngaarden.nl 

www.rug.nl/sciencelinx/index