The Massachusetts Institute of Technology's "cyborg botany" researchers have turned plants into sensors and displays, suggesting we use them as a gentle alternative to electronic screens.
Harpreet Sareen and Pattie Maes from the MIT Media Lab's Fluid Interfaces Group have been researching how to merge plants and artificial electronics to create new interfaces.
"Plants are normally thought of as passive creatures in the environment," said Sareen. "Contrary to this, they can not only sense what's happening around them, but respond and display naturally."
"Through cyborg botany, we power some of our digital functions with the natural abilities of plants."
Plants developed that can communicate 
The team's two new projects, titled Phytoactuators and Planta Digitalis respectively, focus on human interaction. They use plants for sensing and display ? the two essential elements that complete an interaction loop. This means that a person can tell a plant to do something, and the plant can also communicate some information back.
They build on Sareen and Maes' previous project Elowan ? a plant-robot hybrid powered by the organism's need for light.

For the first project, Phytoactuators, the researchers connected electrodes to several key spots on a Venus flytrap and a Mimosa pudica. This allows the plant to receive signals.
Through an accompanying app, users can watch a live stream of the plant and click on its on-screen leaves to trigger the...