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Scientists Discover Way to Send Information into Black Holes Without Using Energy

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Forget Concrete: Scientists Built a Wall That Grows, Breathes, and Heals Itself

Concrete has long been the backbone of modern architecture. Strong, durable, and reliable, it has shaped our cities for over a century. But now, a radical breakthrough is challenging everything we thought we knew about building materials. Scientists have created a living wall material that not only grows and breathes but can also repair its own cracks—essentially a building that heals itself.

A Revolutionary Installation in Venice

The first public glimpse of this new material came at the Canada Pavilion in Venice during the 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale. The pavilion, named Picoplanktonics, was unlike any typical architectural installation. Its walls were made of 3D-printed forms embedded with living cyanobacteria, requiring careful daily maintenance of light, humidity, and temperature to survive. If the microbes failed, so did the walls.

Presented by the Canada Council for the Arts, the installation was on display until November 23, 2025. Unlike standard displays that remain static, Picoplanktonics was alive, changing over time as the organisms inside it grew and interacted with their environment.

The Team Behind the Living Walls

The project was developed over four years by the Living Room Collective, an interdisciplinary group led by Canadian architect and biodesigner Andrea Shin Ling. The team approached architecture as a living experiment, designing spaces where materials themselves could interact with their surroundings rather than simply being inert building blocks.

Alongside Ling, researchers including Dalia Dranseike, Yifan Cui, Mark W. Tibbitt, and Benjamin Dillenburger from ETH Zurich contributed to the scientific development of the material. Their goal was to create a structure that wasn’t just alive but could perform useful work—specifically capturing carbon dioxide and reinforcing itself over time.

How the Material Works

At its core, the material relies on Synechococcus sp. PCC 7002, a type of cyanobacteria, embedded in a printable hydrogel called F127-BUM. This hydrogel is photo-cross-linkable, meaning it can be shaped into complex forms while remaining transparent enough to let sunlight through. Light exposure is essential for the cyanobacteria to photosynthesize and grow inside the structure.

Once printed, the walls are far from passive. Over the first 30 days of lab testing, the material visibly turned greener, indicating growth of the cyanobacteria. Mineral deposits began forming inside the hydrogel, strengthening the material. By the end of the test, living samples had grown 36% more dry mass than controls without microbes.

The material grows and strengthens through two mechanisms:

  1. Biological growth – Cyanobacteria fix CO₂ from the air into biomass via photosynthesis.

  2. Microbially induced carbonate precipitation (MICP) – Cyanobacteria create alkaline conditions that cause dissolved ions to form solid carbonates, effectively hardening the structure over time.

After 400 days, the living material had sequestered 26 ± 7 milligrams of CO₂ per gram of hydrogel, most of it stored in a stable, mineralized form.

Why Shape Is Just as Important as Biology

Creating a living wall is not as simple as embedding microbes in a block of gel. Dense materials can support themselves structurally but may block light and nutrients, starving the living cells inside. To solve this, the team used lattice structures, textures, and coral-inspired surfaces to maximize light penetration and nutrient flow.

For example, a 5-millimeter-thick lattice proved optimal for keeping the cyanobacteria alive, while larger porous forms maintained their mineralized structure even after the living cells and hydrogel were removed. This combination of geometry and biology is what made Picoplanktonics more architecture than standard materials science.

The hydrogel itself transmitted 76 ± 3% of visible light, ensuring that cyanobacteria throughout the bulk material—not just at the surface—could photosynthesize. These design choices allowed the pavilion to function as a living experiment at room scale, not just a decorative installation.

Benefits Over Traditional Carbon Capture

While the process of carbon sequestration in living materials is slower than many industrial systems, it has key advantages:

  • Ambient conditions – Works with sunlight and atmospheric CO₂ without energy-intensive processes.

  • No toxic feedstocks – Unlike ureolytic mineralization, it avoids producing harmful byproducts like ammonia.

  • Self-reinforcing – As minerals accumulate, the material becomes mechanically stronger over time.

In other words, the walls don’t just store carbon—they grow stronger as they age, creating the possibility of long-lasting structures that improve rather than degrade over decades.

Limitations and Future Potential

Picoplanktonics is not a ready-made solution for building an entire city. The technology is still in its experimental phase, and scaling it for commercial construction faces challenges such as environmental control, maintenance, and structural load-bearing.

However, the experiment proves a critical point: architecture can host living systems, and materials can remain active long after fabrication. The Nature Communications paper demonstrated 400 days of carbon capture in lab conditions, while the Venice pavilion provided a tangible example of what living architecture might look like.

This combination of science and design represents a significant shift in how we think about materials. Buildings could one day breathe, heal themselves, and actively fight climate change—all while serving the aesthetic and functional needs of human occupants.

A Glimpse Into the Future

Imagine walking into a building where the walls are not just structural elements but living partners. They would adjust to light, repair cracks automatically, and even help combat climate change by capturing carbon. That future may not be far off. With projects like Picoplanktonics, scientists and architects are showing that the next generation of materials is alive.

By combining biology, materials science, and architecture, we are entering an era where buildings are no longer static monuments but evolving systems that interact with their environment. The living walls of today could evolve into self-healing, carbon-negative cities of tomorrow.

Concrete may have served humanity for centuries, but the walls of the future may not just stand—they may grow, breathe, and thrive.

Reference: Dranseike, D., Cui, Y., Ling, A.S. et al. Dual carbon sequestration with photosynthetic living materials. Nat Commun 16, 3832 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-58761-y

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