Fab Labs are the educational outreach component for the Center for Bits and Atoms (CBA) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 2001 the National Science Foundation in Washington, D.C. funded MIT's Center for Bits and Atoms, an ambitious interdisciplinary initiative that is looking beyond the end of the Digital Revolution to ask how a functional description of a system can be embodied in, and abstracted from, a physical form. CBA's laboratory research on technologies for personal fabrication is complemented by the field "Fab Lab" program that brings prototyping capabilities to under-served communities that have been beyond the reach of conventional technology development and deployment. By making accessible engineering in space (down to microns, through precision machining) and time (down to microseconds, through RISC microcontrollers), these facilities have been uncovering what can be thought of as instrumentation and fabrication divides, and suggesting that they can be addressed by bringing IT development rather than just IT to the masses.

The engineering capability for design and fabrication at length and time scales described above opens up numerous possibilities for innovative solutions to common problems. Since local communities themselves foster this innovation, it can lead to sustainable solutions. High-end technological solutions have not been addressing problems faced on the local level as yet; therefore, we believe fab labs will provide a thriving incubator for local micro-businesses.

CBA Fab Labs have been opened in rural India, northern Norway, Ghana, Boston and Costa Rica. Fab Lab outreach projects are being explored with a growing group of institutional partners and countries including Panama, Trinidad, South Africa, the National Academies, the Indian Department of Science and Technology, and the Africa-America Institute.

What is a fab lab? Read on . . .