Mon. 16.03.2020, 19.00 – 21.30
Mon. 23.03.2020, 19.00 – 22.00
Sat. 4.04.2020, 14.00 – 18.00
Sat. 18.04.2020, 14.00 – 18.00 / networking and open house gathering
>top Lab is happy to announce the third edition of the mushroom cultivation and fungal fabrication course!
It will happen within the “Mind The Fungi” project, a citizen science activity of TU Berlin, Institute for Biotechnology, Art Laboratory Berlin (2018-2020) in collaboration with >top Transdisciplinary Project Space & >top Lab starting from mid-March, 2020.
At >top Lab, your learning experience is crucial, and through our experience, we keep improving the course. How to set up and run a mycology* laboratory at home, grow mushrooms independently and produce own mycelium based objects
*Mycology is the branch of biology concerned in the study of mushrooms
Course schedule:
The classes will take place at >top Lab on:
Monday 16 March, 19.00 – 21.30
Monday 23 March, 19.00 – 22.00
Saturday 4 April, 14.00- 18.00
Saturday 18 April, 14.00 – 18.00 / networking and open house gathering
What experience will you get by attending the mushroom fabrication course?
* Learn how to set up and run self-organized mycofabrication activities at home
* Learn directly from TU Berlin scientists and >top Lab’s practitioners about mushrooms biology and mycology techniques.
* Participate in a citizen science project about biomaterials.
What are the requirements?
* No prior biology or laboratory knowledge is needed to attend. Crash courses will be given at opportune moments during the course.
* Attending the first session is mandatory.
Terms and conditions of the registration:
* The payment of the fee in advance is mandatory to book a place for the workshop.
* In case of overbooking, a waiting list will be created. We may open a parallel course.
* In case of cancellation of a reserved place, the ticket will be refunded just in case another participant takes over that place by covering the fee.
* There are 15 available places.
* The course will take place with a minimum of 10 participants.
* In case the number of participants will not be reached, the fee will be refunded.
Registration and fee:
For the mycolab course the fee will be 70€. Get in contact with us via email to reserve a place: lab@top-ev.de (First come, first served. Waiting list is possible)
What will you learn in detail:
DAY 1: 16th March 2020
Mycology* and laboratory crash course; Mushroom isolation techniques.
Prepare the Petri dishes to grow mushrooms; prepare the mushroom and grow it in the Petri dishes.
DAY 2: 23rd March 2020
Introduction to mycofabrication;
Prepare jars to increase the biomass production.
Fabricate a simple fungal object.
DAY 3: 04th April 2020
Prepare grow bags to grow more mushroom biomass;
Fabricate your own object.
DAY 4: 18th April 2020
Drying and finishing the first myco-object;
Networking session: participants of the previous sessions and friends of the Berlin Fungi network are invited to get in contact and exchange ideas.
The team:
Prof Dr.-Ing. Vera Meyer, Head of chair at TU Berlin, Department of Applied Molecular Microbiology (AMM)
Dipl. Ing. Bertram Schmidt, Research assistant at TU Berlin, AMM
Dipl. Ing. Carsten Pohl, Research assistant at TU Berlin, AMM
Christian de Lutz, Curator, Researcher & Co-Director of Art Laboratory Berlin
Regine Rapp M.A., Curator, Researcher & Co-Director of Art Laboratory Berlin
Dr. Flavia Barragan, Chemist & Co-founder of >top Lab
M.Sc. Alessandro Volpato, Biologist & Co-founder of >top Lab
Tuce Erel, curator & cultural worker, >top Transdisciplinary Project Space member
Mind the Fungi
Art Laboratory Berlin together with TU Berlin, Institute for Biotechnology work on the Art & Science project Mind the Fungi, which is dedicated to the research of local mushrooms and current fungal biotechnology.
Mushrooms are used in biotechnology as cell factories to produce antibiotics, immunosuppressants, cholesterol-lowering drugs, antimalarials, insulin, prebiotics, pigments, organic acids, enzymes, polyunsaturated fatty acids, vitamins and more. The fungal biotechnology of the 20th century managed to establish itself as an essential platform technology for innumerable branches of industry and thus decisively shapes our daily life and our lifestyle in an invisible way.
At the moment, fungal biotechnology is undergoing a disruptive innovation process, which we want to co-design with citizen scientists in a sustainable manner. Mushrooms, which are produced on the basis of renewable vegetable raw materials in the biotechnological process, are to be converted, with far-reaching consequences, into packaging materials, building materials, and even leather.
In the project Mind the Fungi we use the interdisciplinary concept from STEM to STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, Art) to expand scientific research with artistic and design-based research. The Institute of Biotechnology works with Berlin citizens, artists and designers to develop new ideas and technologies for mushroom and lichen-based materials of the future. The Artists in Residence programme brings art and design into the project as a constructive source of ideas, multipliers and communicators of scientific issues, and supports the process of sharing research processes and findings with the public.
With the expertise of applied and molecular microbiology in the field of fungal biotechnology (Prof. Meyer), bioprocess engineering (Prof. Neubauer) and art and science communication (Art Laboratory Berlin) the aim of the project is also to establish a new, innovative and interdisciplinary field of research at the TU Berlin, which dares right from the beginning to build a bridge in the growing Citizen Science Community in order to integrate their expertise at an early stage.
