C&EN talks with Wil Srubar, structural engineer

As human populations grow, the built environment expands alongside them, with skyscrapers and multiplexes towering over urban corridors. But manufacturing construction materials usually means burning fossil fuels as we replace green space with concrete. Wil Srubar hopes to disrupt this cycle with a nature-inspired concrete alternative that can be produced without fossil fuels and massive carbon emissions. It’s just one outcome of work being done in his interdisciplinary Living Materials Laboratory at the University of Colorado Boulder. A structural engineer, Srubar recruits biologists, chemists, physicists, materials scientists, and a host of engineers to his lab, where they design biomimetic building materials. Think concrete with veinlike systems of stringy fungi that can self-repair cracks, inspired by the human circulatory system; 3D-printed earthen materials reinforced by bacteria and biopolymers; or light-emitting architectural materials designed for use in space that harness natural bioluminescence. Robin Donovan talked to Srubar about building greener cities, mentorship,