An interdisciplinary team of researchers put a culture of the edible mushroom species Pleurotus eryngii (also known as the king oyster mushroom) in control of a pair of vehicles, which can twitch and roll across a flat surface.

By applying algorithms based on the extracellular electrophysiology of P. eryngii mycelia and feeding the output into a microcontroller unit, the researchers used spikes of activity triggered by a stimulus – in this case, UV light – to toggle mechanical responses in two different kinds of mobile device.

https://youtu.be/5ZkkaM54RH8

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/scirobotics.adk8019

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27 points

my rule not to eat anything smarter than i am is steering me worryingly close to mushroomless waters

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5 points

They’re fruits. If you’re not eating the colony itself, I think it’s okay.

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5 points

They’re fruits

oh god it’s cannibalism then; sin compounded upon sin

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3 points

Sunflowers move towards the sun on their own, this isn’t much different from that.

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22 points

Must… Resist… Urge… To… Stomp

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I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:

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“This kind of project is not just about controlling a robot,” says Cornell bioroboticist Anand Mishra.

“It is also about creating a true connection with the living system. Because once you hear the signal, you also understand what’s going on. Maybe that signal is coming from some kind of stresses. So you’re seeing the physical response, because those signals we can’t visualize, but the robot is making a visualization.

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I can’t attune myself to feel kinship with any living beings unless they’re showing it in ways that I perceive as communication, so I force them into expressing in those ways.

Just straight up mad scientist shit.

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17 points

Future earth that has nothing but a war thats sigularity ai robots vs mycelial robots. No evidence of humanity left anywhere.

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10 points

Niear automata but the aliens are fungi

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