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Ars Technica

Ars Technica

Robot placed under the control of a fungal overlord

Ars Technica
Summary
Nutrition label

78% Informative

Scientists at Cornell University built biohybrid robots controlled by mushrooms.

The mycelium is a large network of branching filamentous structures called hyphae.

Fungi use it to sense the environment and communicate with each other through electrical signals.

The team demonstrated the mushrooms could control the robots by having them move toward or away from a UV light source.

“We have the ability to reinject spores and nutrients to regrow over the old mycelium, and that’s going to be a neat kind of thing. The life and death and rebirth of our robots,” Shepherd says. Science Robotics , 2024 . DOI: 10.1126 /scirobotics.adk8019.

VR Score

81

Informative language

81

Neutral language

63

Article tone

informal

Language

English

Language complexity

55

Offensive language

possibly offensive

Hate speech

not hateful

Attention-grabbing headline

not detected

Known propaganda techniques

not detected

Time-value

long-living

Source diversity

1

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