BLOMs (Bio-technological Living Olfactory Memory system), is a smell memory storage system that creates a complex interplay between human experience and technological advancement, particularly in the context of how we perceive and interact with the passage of time. With advanced technology, we gain the ability to effortlessly capture, revisit, and even create moments in time. Yet, what aspects of the human experience remain elusive amidst this capability? Through this project, I aim to discover the dimension of aliveness in the technology usage process by using olfactory sense and embodiment through immersive narrative and framework with my speculative fiction, Being and Time.

One of my greatest curiosities is identifying the effects of intertwining technology with the essence of our moments.

"We shall need to reawaken our experience of the world as it appears to us in so far as we are in the world through our body, and in so far as we perceive the world with our body. But by thus remaking contact with the body and with the world, we shall also rediscover ourself, since, perceiving as we do with our body, the body is a natural self and, as it were, the subject of perception." (Phenomenology of Perception, Merleau-Ponty)

Merleau-Ponty points out our body imbue existence with meaning. In this project, our body and its senses are inputs as we communicate with our environment at a specific moment. Bacteria are the interface in which the moment is stored, and their existence requires active maintenance and care to keep the experience alive.

By maintaining and caring for bacteria that can create the environment we previously lived in, we are allowed to revisit the moment, finding kinship with our saved experiences.

BLOMs is a system that is a combination of two key prototypes that capture and encode smell data for future recall in a smell recollection device:

The Nose captures the smell memory. Like the human nose, it has olfactory bulbs and nerves that analyze the smell based on incoming molecules and save it into the cartridge as smell data. The Bacteria Hub and Cloud save and recall smell memories that you have captured. The Bacteria Hub extracts smell memory data from the cartridge and sends it to a chosen Bacteria Cloud. The bacteria in the cloud store the smell memory by encoding it in their DNA. To recall a smell memory, a user extracts the smell memory data from the bacteria onto the cartridge, which is then activated by placing it into a recalling nose device.

This system is a design practice based on the exploration of not only new technology but also individual existence influenced by the existentialism of Martin Heidegger and the phenomenology of Merleau-Ponty, focusing on human behavioral research. As a designer, I focus on enhancing the essence of human experience through sensory pleasure, residing at the intersection of technology and human behavior.

To answer my questions, the area of research was:

- Philosophy research is needed to redefine the meaning of aliveness.

- The relationship between olfactory sense and memories.

- Biotechnology of storing data in bacteria.

- Human behavior study for embodiment.

Based on these researches, the process of design for bringing to life was:

- Material experiment and iteration.

- Technical part- Physical computing.

- Immersive narrative and framework.

- Workshop and User test.

The Nose.

The Nose in my project is between an organ and a tool. As an organ, the Nose has olfactory bulbs and nerves that are stimulated when they detect molecules, the substance of smell. As a tool, molecules are analyzed and saved in the Cartridge as smell memory data. These days, tools have been developed for olfactory sense, for example, E-Nose (Electronic-Nose), which collects the data of molecules and identifies the smell based on the database by using sensors. The Nose's form is made from a human nose shape. To emphasize capturing the smell of the environment, it developed the idea of what if our nose is 360 degrees and each hole on this Nose has the same function as our nostrils. The Nose operates by gesture. When the user raises their hand and squeezes the nose, a flexible sensor detects the movement of finger bending and the vibration motor in the Nosenotifies the user that a moment was captured. By connecting sensors with gestures, a moment is translated from an ephemeral instance to an embodied sense through physical sensation and directed attention. To enhance the bodily form, the Nose is cast with silicon for tactility and 3D printed to form fit the wearer's hand, creating a seamless, flexible augmented appendage. The sense of olfaction is difficult to objectively define, it's strongly connected to our emotions and memories since the olfactory neuron system is closely connected and directly sends signals to brain regions involved in memory and emotion. In Korean, ??(Hyang-su) can mean either scent or nostalgia. I started the curiosity of olfactory sense from this cultural language perspective, pursing the connection between the smell and fleeting moments, rather than the feeling of yearning to relive past memories. The end of the day. The bathroom after taking a shower. 9 a.m. class. The hug. This is an extracted list that users captured and saved or like to capture through my system. It shows this Nose expands to capture the smell of their moments with their emotion in their daily life.

Saving through Bacteria.

To save smell memory data in the bacteria storage system, put the Cartridge on the Bacteria Hub and press the button for extracting the smell memory data. In this process, the smell memory data gets ready to be saved in bacteria. After extraction, press the button of the chosen Bacteria Cloud, and the extracted smell memory is moved to the chosen Bacteria Cloud and saved in Bacteria living in the Bacteria Cloud. Based on existing bacteria shapes and characteristics, I designed the shapes of each Bacteria Cloud and made it through glasswork for visual representation. For the embodied process of pressing the button, this system uses air pump motors to extract and send the smell memory data. The storage of memory technology has a long history going back to ancient murals. That technology now exists in the form of cell phones and AR and VR technologies but also data storage methods using bacteria that have been studied for more than a decade uses binary conversion of data and encoding it into bacterial DNA. However, this project focused on what it means to store data in bacteria and how it can affect our daily lives. Since the bacteria are living, they have requirements for survival, such as nutrition, moisture, and temperature, which means the user needs to maintain them to keep their saved smell memory. Although capturing the smell memory is not hard with the Nose device, maintaining that captured smell memory they have easy. Because through buttons next to the Bacteria Cloud, the user has to feed and adjust the temperature once a day. Through these acts of care and nurture, users can take out build a relationship - kinship with bacteria that hold their smell memory. This invisible bacterial storage interface will give meaning to itself by the user caring for the storage system like one would take care of a pet or a plant, with the added significance of personal experiences being stored within it.

To use this system.

Decide the moment that you want to capture and wear the Nose.

Put the cartridge in the Nose.

Raise your hand. And squeeze the Nose.

Take out the cartridge and put it on the Bacteria Hub.

Press the extract button.

Choose the Bacteria Cloud that you want to save.

Press the button to save the smell memory data you captured.

Don't forget to take care of them! Because it's alive, it can die.

Through this project, I explored not only the possibility of the larger memory system but also how the relationship between technology (with the usage process) and the human body affects the essence of our existence. This Nose embodies your intention to take this moment in daily life and carry that moment with you by taking care of Bacteria Storage.