This Week’s Creepy Robot: Moldbot
Thanks to a post on Boing Boing, we bring you news of moldbot. Researchers from the University of Southampton in the UK and Japan’s Kobe University grafted some mold onto a circuit and used it as the “brain” for a small bug-bot. The mold, Physarum polycephalum, is sensitive to light, so illuminating parts of the cyber-slime makes the robot react in similar ways. Okay, this might not seem like much, but it is a first step towards not just organic-robotic machines, but bots that are controlled by organic material. Lead scientist on the project, Klaus-Peter Zauner, says in New Scientist, “On the nanoscale, we have to learn how to work with autonomous components. We have to let molecules do what they naturally do.” Has he not seen The Terminator or The Matrix?
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