The 11th ARCHITECTONICA SEMINAR Held at the Koishikawa Annex, the University Museum
Date of activity: November 26, 2016
The 11th ARCHITECTONICA SEMINAR was held at the Koishikawa Annex of the University Museum on November 26, 2016. "ARCHITECTONICA SEMINAR" is a series of lectures presented by researchers from various fields of science and the arts on the aspects of "architecture." As part of the event, each speaker also exhibits a collection of specimens related to the lectures under the title "Architectonica Collection."
The 11th seminar of this series, which was attended by sixty-eight people, was given by Dr. Katsuhiro Sano, a project assistant professor of prehistoric archaeology from the University Museum, the University of Tokyo, entitled "Architecture of stone tools ― Human evolution inferred from lithic reduction strategies." As a prehistoric archaeologist, Dr. Sano studies the changes in hunting methods through the use-wear analysis of stone tools. For this lecture, his focus was on the design of stone tools and this was the first time that a lecture in the ARCHITECTONICA SEMINAR series dealt with the material properties and characteristics. Dr. Sano demonstrated the forms, production methods and the functions of stone tools using 3D scan data and movies on the production of stone tools. Subsequently, he showed that the manufacturing process of stone tools is "reduction," while architecture in construction relies on adding components together. Dr. Sano also explored how the design and use of stone tools evolved through their history by specifically taking scrapers, knives and spearheads as examples.
A new collection named "Actual size 3D printed replicas of Paleolithic stone tools from the Jabrud Rockshelter, Syria" is currently being exhibited.
The provisional title of the next ARCHITECTIONICA SEMINAR on Saturday, February 25, 2017 is "Architecture of the solar system――the 4.6 billion year record of meteorites" which will be given by Dr. Takafumi Niihara, project assistant professor of meteoritics and mineralogy from the University Museum. Further details will be published on our website below.
Actual size 3D printed replicas of paleolithic stone tools from the Jabrud Rockshelter in Syria 
Dr. Sano giving his lecture at the 11th ARCHITECTONICA SEMINAR
