A robot controlled by a light-sensitive mushroom

A recent article in the journal ScienceRobotics is interesting.

Researchers at Cornell have come up with a novel way to control a walking robot: with a mushroom.

Cornell explained in a press release that these four-legged “biohybrid” robots were built by researchers who literally grew mycelia, the below ground connective threads that allow fungal communities to communicate, into the robot itself.

“By growing mycelium into the electronics of a robot,” explained mechanical and aerospace engineering professor Rob Shepard, “we were able to allow the biohybrid machine to sense and respond to the environment.”

Because this research marries organic and inorganic components, it took an interdisciplinary approach to bring these fungi-powered fun guys to life.

You have to have a background in mechanical engineering, electronics, some mycology, some neurobiology, some kind of signal processing,” he explained. “All these fields come together to build this kind of system.”

Read more on The_Byte and see the paper abstract here.


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