Abstract
Richard Buckminster Fuller was an American designer who created fantastic designs. His non-conformist creative design ability was augmented with an urge to realize the prototypes not only for practical demonstration but also for widespread use. His creations called for new vocabulary such as synergy, tensegrity, Dymaxion, and the eponymous Fullerene. He had a design science philosophy of his own. He thought beyond the design of artifacts. He strived for sustainable living in the global world long before these concepts became important for the world to deal with. He is described as a comprehensive anticipatory design scientist. In this article, only his physical design artifacts that include two of his lasting design contributions, namely, the tensegrity structures and the geodesic domes are discussed.
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G K Ananthasuresh is Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Coordinator of the Bioengineering Programme at IISc, Bengaluru. His principal area of interest is optimal design of stiff structures and elastically deformable compliant mechanisms, which have applications in product design, microelectromechanical systems, biomechanics of living cells, and protein design. This is his third article for Resonance, extolling the works of great engineers.
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Ananthasuresh, G.K. Buckminster fuller and his fabulous designs. Reson 20, 98–122 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12045-015-0159-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12045-015-0159-6