Penn researchers are turning food scraps into building materials — from pineapple peels to celery stalks

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Imagine living in a house made of pineapple and mango skins, where the scent would greet you as you enter and leave your home. And imagine that the materials used to construct your home were sourced from daily waste and did not contribute to increased carbon emissions. What’s more, the materials will not end up in a landfill or incinerator if the house were to be torn down.

This is the future that Laia Mogas-Soldevila, an assistant professor of architecture at the University of Pennsylvania, and her research assistant Yasaman Amirzehni don’t just dream of but are working to build at the Weitzman School of Design’s DumoLab.

“The biomaterials revolution is coming and we all need to be prepared to be able to deliver materials that are healthier, that can biodegrade naturally and then still perform the same way concrete performs, the same way technical ceramics perform,” Mogas-Soldevila said.

This “biomaterials revolution” begins on campus at the Hill House cafeteria, where each week workers employed by Penn Dining caterer Bon Appétit chop between 35 to 40 cases of pineapple for students who line up at a fruit salad bar.

“Working with DumoLabs to take fruit peels and turn them into sustainable building blocks is something that we’re really excited about,” said Shazad Khan, culinary director for Bon Appétit at Penn. “Having natural antioxidant properties from pineapples that can go into blocks that help to keep them mold-free, for example, or the natural insulation properties of melon skins that can go into these bricks to help create warmth, is something that we’re really excited about.”