Exoskeletons

Research in the park by Charles Walcott on trilobites in the late 1800s provided the foundation for his theory of the “Cambrian Explosion,” a term he used to describe the relatively sudden appearance of complex multi-cellular life possessing “hard parts” such as phosphatic or calcitic exoskeletons.

In the Philippines, as children, my brother and I kept jars of captured tropical spiders in our library room. The spiders had thick exoskeletons that made them look like crabs.

Exoskeletons can help disabled people.

We need to develop exoskeletons that can help disabled people.

One of the challenges to designing prosthetics, or exoskeletons for the disabled, is that everyone is different. Technology designed to help a person walk or get around doesn't work very well when it is built to be one-size-fits-all. But scientists at Carnegie Mellon University have figured out a quick, easy way to make each prosthetic different.

I have been studying Japanese aesthetics consciously since my teenage years on Lulu Island, or maybe even before, as a prepubescent somewhat unwittingly in the Philippines. In Quezon City, we kids watched Japanese samurai shows and cartoons. We made Zero fighters and Messerschmidts as cardboard airplanes to hang from the ceiling of our library, where we had collection jars of crab-like spiders with thick exoskeletons. On Lulu Island, I studied autodidactically the basics of Hiragana, Katakana, and Kanji, the components of the Japanese language, during vacation as a teenager, whilst I did also watercolour painting and sculptures from DAS air-dry clay. I then took Japanese language in university. In my twenties, I actually lived in Japan for some time. Later, for years on my Social Media, I have been observing exquisite Japanese images. And I become a fan of anime. To me, Japanese aesthetics allude to Finnish, Eskimo, and Polynesian artwork. Japanese art can contrast the ancient with the ultramodern.