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"[Science fiction] is the only kind of writing that allows you to look at the world we live in and change one piece at a time."
- Frederik Pohl

Self-Healing Building  
  A building that responds to stresses or cracks in walls by healing the damaged portion.  

It was a beautiful room all right, with opaque plastex walls and white fluo-glass ceiling, but something terrible had happened there. As it responded to me, the ceiling lifting slightly and the walls growing less opaque, reflecting my perspective-seeking eye, I noticed that curious mottled knots were forming, indicating where the room had been strained and healed faultily. Deep hidden rifts began to distort the sphere...
Technovelgy from The Thousand Dreams of Stellavista, by J.G. Ballard.
Published by Amazing Fact and Science Fiction in 1962
Additional resources -

See also the entry for plastex, which further describes the material.

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Additional resources:
  More Ideas and Technology from The Thousand Dreams of Stellavista
  More Ideas and Technology by J.G. Ballard
  Tech news articles related to The Thousand Dreams of Stellavista
  Tech news articles related to works by J.G. Ballard

Self-Healing Building-related news articles:
  - Self-Healing Metal Coating
  - Nanotech Self-Healing Houses
  - Self-Healing Polymer Autonomous Material System
  - Autonomous Adaptive Structure Uses Shape Memory Polymer

Articles related to Living Space
Vast Apartment Living Will Get Even More Vast
LiquidView Ersatz Windows, ala Philip K. Dick
Solar House Concept Unfolds Solar Panels Like A Flower
San Fran's Tiny Homeless

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Science Fiction in the News

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'Nanny is different,' Tom Fields murmured... 'she's not like a machine. She's like a person.'

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'...we've promised him a generous pension from the royalties.'

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'At the end of each appendage's eight fingers there are tinier appendages...'

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'We want to do something to help those who are suffering from tooth loss or absence,' said lead researcher Katsu Takahashi.

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'...power pack the size of a pea.'

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