The concept of Urban Metabolism (UM) traces its origins back to A. Wolman in 1965. In UM studies, the city is compared to a living organism. The term 'metabolism' finds its roots in Greek, signifying 'conversion' or 'transformation.' While originally used to describe physiological processes within individual organisms, the concept of metabolism has found application in fields such as biology, ecosystems, architecture and even cultural systems.
In 2007, Kennedy and colleagues proposed a revised definition of UM as "the sum total of technical and socioeconomic processes occurring in cities, resulting in growth, energy production, and waste elimination" (Kennedy, et al, 2007). This definition remains foundational in the field. UM studies scrutinize the sourcing of resources, the pathways through which resources enter a system, and their circulation within it, including eventual elimination.
Urban designers have embraced UM to explore community issues, leading to the implementation of several models in a bottom-up participatory fashion in recent years.
