Abstract
This inquiry explores how cellular automations (CA) can be used to characterize open thermodynamic systems. Open thermodynamic systems describe the formation of buildings, landscapes, and cities; systems shaped by the exchange of energy and material flowing through the larger environments of which they are a part. Unlike models focused on the formation of objects, this inquiry focuses on cell-based modelling that brings us into contact with the forces that shape objects. This research uses CA to visualize the dynamic and constantly evolving exchange of mass and energy that characterize these systems. This methodology explores “non-expert” modelling, i.e. models generated across disciplinary boundaries, in an effort to yield trans-disciplinary insights. This model connects architectural practices to silviculture literature through a simulation that characterizes the role of disturbance on the spatial patterns of forest succession. While this model mimics forest development at the landscape scale, forests may also be modelled as a micro-scaled variable in a global carbon model or as macro-scaled variable in models that characterize thermodynamic performance at the building-scale.
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Mans, J., Yamada, J. (2015). Formations of Energy: Modelling Toward an Understanding of Open Thermodynamic Systems. In: Thomsen, M., Tamke, M., Gengnagel, C., Faircloth, B., Scheurer, F. (eds) Modelling Behaviour. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-24208-8_11
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