The time is upon me when I need to start thinking about what sort of concrete results I can take from the time that’s left on this residency. I tend to think that the development of some sort of system, or a prototype of that system, that I can carry on working with would be a good idea. Maybe the apparatus I was imagining I could use to etch the landscape images whilst monitoring bacterial behaviours and states will be reworked as a general investigative fermenter.
A fermenter is a piece of laboratory equipment used for the intensive culture of microbes in quantities from a litre at smallest to many hundreds at biggest. The device is normally hooked up to a biocontroller to monitor and control the inputs and outputs and a PC to log the data over time. We have one hooked up at the moment in the lab where we’re trying to build up the quantities of our thiobacilli.
The logging computer is out of shot to the right but we can see the business end of the thing here. The machinery on the right is the biocontroller which is the primary interface receiving data from the sensors and controlling the stirrer and any necessary environmental conditioning devices. On the left is the actual fermenter vessel which has a number of ports in the lid for the placement of air lines and sensor probes - in this one we have Ph, dissolved oxygen and temperature - as well as housing the stirrer motor. Inside the vessel are the air manifiold and the stirrer arm and blades. Its all very scientific and rigorous.
So I’m considering building one of these for artistic use. Apparently I can commandeer a flask from the science department, I’m ordering a couple of probes and a stirrer can be built using a cheap dc motor. The air supply and manifold is easy for someone with my experience of cobbling together apparatus from cheap aquarium gear and I can hook the whole thing up to the Muio board to read the sensors and control the motor. That would be enough to get a similar level of data out of the system and a basic level of environmental control in.
The addition of a couple of speakers, a small LCD screen and some LED arrays should give me enough to begin testing the developing microbial colony’s reactions to information overload. A satellite hook up feature can be added at some point in the future alongside radio receivers and transmitters.