In humans and animals, the brain sends signals to indicate hunger, animals go hunting, while humans go to the refrigerator. But in plants, this process is controlled by the roots, which grow toward areas rich in nutrients.
This idea inspired the study “Biomimetic Plant-Root-Inspired Robotic Sensor System”, which was developed within the framework of the Plantoid Project. As Dr. Mònica Mir Llorente, expert on sensors and one of the study authors from the IBEC, Barcelona explains, they collaborated with the Instituto Italiano di Tecnologia in Pisa to develop the robotic components. In the study they presented the sensors that were inserted at the tips of the robotic roots.
Dr. Mir Llorente says that plant roots can sense chemicals in the soil, such as nutrients. This ability of roots to grow toward nutrient-rich areas is called chemotropism. Inspired by this, the team developed robotic roots that can move like real plant roots and designed special sensors for the tips of these roots. These sensors can measure nutrient levels and other soil conditions. By using the information from the sensors, the robots can decide where to move, and this allows the robots to explore the soil.
When it comes to the impact of studying plant behavior on your work, what advantages or disadvantages would you highlight? What do you find interesting? How long does the development of the sensors take?
Also, in the field of microfluidics, plants have a very interesting microfluidic system with concentric channels for upward fluid flow, i.e. plant structures show how to efficiently manage small amounts of fluid in narrow channels generated by the self-organisation of cell plants forming efficient microchannels. In addition to root sensing, we have a very good understanding of behavior and how good or how sensitive roots are at detecting, for example, different water content. So all of this is quite interesting, and also, plants can communicate with each other by sending out molecules, volatile organic molecules or VOCs substances that can flow into the air to warn other plants to protect themselves. To protect themselves, plants are able to change their metabolism to produce more hormones to reactivate their immune system. The time to develop this type of technology varies somewhat depending, but can take around 6 and 12 months of research.
What future innovations or applications of plantoids could be the most important for Europe? What do you think is the biggest misconception about these robots, and what would you like people to know?
Dr. Mònica Mir Llorente: It’s hard to say because many groups are working in different areas of plant study. But, in the area of sensors, for example, there is research focused on printing sensors on plant leaves to detect in situ the presence of VOCs generated in the plant to analyse threats to the plant. Perhaps the most typical misconception about robots, which has recently resurfaced with the emergence of AI, is that they will take all our jobs. Perhaps certain jobs that require more strength, monotonous tasks, managing extreme conditions, analysing big data, may have more advantages for robots. But when it comes to creativity, innovation, empathy, warmth, understanding, leadership, people management, robots have many shortcomings. So, perhaps robots can free us from certain activities that are difficult for humans, to focus more on relevant issues.
Can robots like this help in agriculture, for example, to analyse the quality of the soil and to detect pollution?
Dr. Mònica Mir Llorente Actually, in the Plantoid project we had focused more on using the ability of the roots to analyse nutrients in soil. So, plants have high ability to detect different types of molecules at low concentrations, and we were able to reproduce that behavior of plants. But thinking on a environmental application of this technology, another type of sensor can be integrated and we can focus the detection to analyse pollution in soils.
How challenging is the development process to market availability in Europe?
Dr. Mònica Mir Llorente: The Plantoid project was a proof of concept, so we developed a technology to demonstrate the hypothesis of being able to create robots that imitate the behavior of plants: growing towards nutrients, as the roots of plants do. Therefore, this technology is still far from being an industrialisable technology.
To bring this technology to the market, it is necessary to study the market requirements in soil monitoring to decide what type of analyses might be most in demand or necessary, and for which applications, and having this point clear, redesign the technology to adapt it to the needs of the market.
How much could plant-inspired robots help in critical situations like floods, if innovation progresses fast enough in that direction, given everything that’s going on? Is it expensive to develop such robots?
Dr. Mònica Mir Llorente: To monitor critical environmental situations, this type of technology can be easily adapted, for example in case of drought. For this application, instead of nutrient sensors we can integrate a moisture sensor to make the robot grow towards soil with higher humidity.
Some of the technology is already developed, so probably adapting to industrial applications is not that far away and not that expensive. It’s hard to put a value on it, but for example, in care devices in medical applications, I developed a point of care system to analyse infections that came to market and cost about a million, but probably the development could be much simpler and more affordable for this type of technology.
How much can plant-inspired robotics help Europe develop a green and sustainable future? And where do you think the biggest challenge is?
Dr. Mònica Mir Llorente: Plants live in almost every place on Earth in different habitats, developing adaptations that allow them to survive and reproduce in a variety of conditions, in some cases extreme. The study of plants can give us many clues about adaptation to environments, nanomaterials, sustainability and energy efficiency, so studying the great diversity of plants can open up many possibilities not only in robotics but also in new materials, energy and sensors.
Do these robots receive enough attention from politicians or decision-makers? How can we involve politicians and decision-makers more in this process? From where should we start?
Dr. Mònica Mir Llorente: It is a technology that is growing, and I think that Europe should be in the first position to compete with Asia and the United States. Otherwise, the industrialisation of Europe will be left behind.
I think that governments pay little attention in general to research, not only to robotics. They usually realise its importance, when other countries already realise its importance. But I think it is important not to be in the queue in innovation. If you are the first, you have more options to develop this industry faster and better than other countries.
The first point is dissemination. This is usually in the hands of scientists, but we are not experts in this. I think it would be very useful to have the collaboration of people like you who can disseminate it in a wider way. This is what makes it easier to reach everyone, not just governments. However, the government should be more involved in these innovations if it is interested in the industrialisation of its country, and they should not have to find out about what we do, only through the news. And the attention of the government should be translated into better funding of research.