Robots and plants are being intricately linked into a new type of living technology that its creators believe could be used to grow a house. 'The growth is for free, but we have to control the plants to grow in the shapes we want,' explained Professor Heiko Hamann, from the University of Lübeck in Germany, who coordinates the EU-funded flora robotica project. The plants grow through a network of sensors, computers and 3D-printed robotic nodes that are connected to each other and constantly monitor the plants. The team uses a white plastic scaffolding with black strips woven into it to guide the growth. The strips contain LED lights and sensors that can cause plants to grow into pre-programed shapes.

Flora Robotica is a project funded by the European Union whose goal is "to develop and investigate closely linked symbiotic relationships between robots and natural plants and to explore the potentials of a plant-robot society able to produce architectural artifacts and living spaces." The overall idea seems to be that it would be cool to enhance the capabilities of plants by mixing in some robotics, and vice versa, combining plant growth with the structure and mobility of robots. The researcheres, from six research groups based in Poland, Denmark, Germany, and Austria, emphasize that their motivation is not automating gardening or harvesting using robots, which is something a number of robotics companies has focused on before; they aren't creating plant-robot hybrids for artistic purposes either (we've seen that in installations like the Telegarden, built in 1995, and, more recently, the Jurema Action Plant, among others). What the European researchers want to do is basically using robots to provide support and guidance to plants, so those plants will be healthier and more robust, and they'll also be somewhat trainable: They'll react to the stimuli coming from the robots, allowing you to incorporate them into living, hybrid structures like benches, walls, and roofs. The robots are implemented as hardware modules that allow to implement an artificial growth process and to keep pace with the natural growth of the plants.

Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your edgy Automaton bloggers. We'll also be posting a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next two months; here's what we have so far (send us your events!): Let us know if you have suggestions for next week, and enjoy today's videos. IHMC has managed to get their ATLAS balancing on the edge of cinder blocks, balancing itself with outstretched arms as it does so. The robot is able to detect and explore partial footholds (in this case line contacts).