🤖 These Transistors Engineered With Bacteria Are Literally Alive
In electrical circuits, transistors switch or amplify electric signals, but researchers at the MIT have swapped in electrical signals for biological ones, using three strains of the bacteria Pantoea agglomerans to “carry” signals across circuits. It takes the cells a lengthy 8 hours to perform each calculation, but the findings, published in Nature Chemical Biology, demonstrate the potential of biotechnology in unexpected ways.
Using this approach, the researchers hope to develop circuits that one day could coat plant leaves or roots, where they could compute to sense and respond to environmental conditions such as drought or attack by pests.
@QSIMedia
In electrical circuits, transistors switch or amplify electric signals, but researchers at the MIT have swapped in electrical signals for biological ones, using three strains of the bacteria Pantoea agglomerans to “carry” signals across circuits. It takes the cells a lengthy 8 hours to perform each calculation, but the findings, published in Nature Chemical Biology, demonstrate the potential of biotechnology in unexpected ways.
“We’re not trying to replace computers, but rather put computational control into biology,” — Christopher Voigt, head of MIT’s Department of Biological Engineering and the study’s senior author, said.
“If you have bacteria on the root of a plant, or the plant itself is doing the computing, running a simple calculation overnight is fast enough relative to a growth season.”
Using this approach, the researchers hope to develop circuits that one day could coat plant leaves or roots, where they could compute to sense and respond to environmental conditions such as drought or attack by pests.
@QSIMedia