Heating and Cooling Bed

Meeting Time 

Tuesday 5PM

Project description

Animals are held captive in zoos across the world away from their natural habitat. This means they experience extreme temparture differences, especially in Arizona, compared to their normal colder climates. This creates an uncomfortable, and possibly dangerous and unhealthy environment for the animals. This in turn creates a less enjoyable experience for zoo visitors as animals generally hide in the cooler shade out of visible sight. Our team is designing a concrete bed with an internal system capable of heating up or cooling down the bed. This allows for a more familiar temperature for the animals allowing them to feel more comfortable as they would in their natural habitat. This would in turn decrease illnesses caused from extreme temperature changes. Before the design of the bed, various other solutions were analyzed such as an ice box, misters, and a geo-thermal cooler. This water cooled/heated bed has become the final design of the project solution. A small scale prototype of 3ft x 2ft has been made and is being tested at the moment.​