Biocafe

2018

Future food is a hot topic of speculation design. I aim to rebuild the relationship between food and human, also motivate individuals to treat food as an equal level biological system. The project tells a new story of body and microbiotas by visualizing how microbes control our mental state in 2050 digital world.

Project Type

Personal project of design research class

Project Length

3 months

Key Words

Biotechnology Speculation
Mental Controlling System

Design Research

Responsibility

Speculation, Design Research, Interview, System Design, Storyboard, Writing, Mockup, and Illustration

01

Background

I am pretty interested in how the food will look like in the future and the relationship with the human. So I researched related topics and their driving elements.

And some changes may affect these issues:

Cultural Appropriation

Lack of Resources

Artificial Intelligence

Relationship with Human

Access of Food

02

Concept Generation

According to researches above, I built 3 possible futures of food:

Production systems

Food recycling systems

Mental functions

I believe microbiota would be a new part of the future food system, which has a great impact on both body and brain.

Human

Food Making

Balanced Relationship

Microbiota

Curing Disease

Food Resource

Adjusting personality

03

Scenario

After learning microbiota's impact on the human mental world, I kept researching how microbiotas help with human's working state, Here I would like to tell a story that how people work with different microbiotas in Biocafe, which is a futural mind control working loop in 2050.

1. Why Biocafe started?

Biocafe started by some economic, political, and technology issues

2. How Biocafe works?

Biocafe follows "MGB-B AXIS" rule.

MGB-B Axis shows that we can control mental health by affecting our microbiota. Thus Biocafe builds the connections between food and brain work to improve working mental state.

M: Microbiota

G: Gut

B: Brain

B: Biocafe

04

Story Telling

I wrote a story about how people use Biocafe to help with the scenario building.

Hi, My name is Dawn! This is 2050. I work as a designer for Google. As we all know, our company is in the Mounting View, a place of super high house prices, so as to the nearby cities. Thanks to Biocafé, I could move to Arizona to avoid high rent and work in Biocafe in front of my door instead of the Google Mount View office.

I need to present my ideas to the managers about my new project today. Because it is my first time to be responsible for a project independently, I feel a little overwhelmed. Today I came to Biocafe to prepare my presentation. First, I logged into Biocafe's app to test my latest genetic data. Second, I borrowed an XR device through a vending machine. Third, I check the equipment and order a drink. After that, I took my drink to add some spices that would change my mood. When I use it, I could see my mood index through my XR device. I placed the cup on the seasoning bar, slammed the seasoning can, and let the seasoning flow down slowly. I can also turn it to adjust the proportion of seasoning.

After the series of actions, I can see the pressure relief track in the interface is increasing.

I gradually felt that the pressure does not make me painful., and I became more energetic to complete my work. In the afternoon, I successfully completed the report. Thanks to Biocafe, I have a more relaxed mood to my task.

05

Objects in Biocafe

5 Perspectives of the final design could be:

Touch

The seasoning finally touched like papers, Because it contains huge amount of fiber and protein

Taste

It just tastes like air. Nothing you will feel through the tongue. It does not affect the original food or drink.

Smell

The stress relieves smells like the sun. Efficient work is more approached to the mixing of mint and grass. And the charming one is flora flavor.

Sound

Customers will tear the paper seasoning to mix with food better.

Sight

The whole experience is a mix of the digital world and the physical world.

Experience of users

What's the mental seasoning looks like? How users get it?

To answer the questions, I did some research on some nutrition support on the market and see people's attitudes and feeling towards them.

Insights

Group of different things looks more joyful
Color and the content exposed to affect the feeling of the package
Small is more precise
Transparent, metal, white leads to medical feeling
Warm color is more related to food
Green is also a general color because it reminds of plants, organic

06

Work Flow

The Biocafe will produce microbiota food by 3D printing the mixer of Protein matrix, Microbiota, and Fiber.

There is a mental seasoning bar in Biocafé that allows people to order mental seasoning and supervise their microbial status. People need to take these mental seasoning each time they begin to work Because the effect only lasts up to 24 hours.