Cornell researchers cultivated an unlikely component, one found not in the lab but on the forest floor: fungal mycelia. By harnessing mycelia’s innate electrical signals, the researchers discovered a new way of controlling “biohybrid” robots that can potentially react to their environment better than their purely synthetic counterparts.
The team’s paper, “Sensorimotor Control of Robots Mediated by Electrophysiological Measurements of Fungal Mycelia,” published Aug. 28 in Science Robotics.
Click on the link to see the mushroom controlled robot in action.
