Plant Tropisms: A Window on Computation and Actuation in Distributed Systems

Seminar
QUEST Center event
No
Speaker
Yasmine Meroz (Tel-Aviv University)
Date
05/05/2025 - 12:00 - 10:30Add to Calendar 2025-05-05 10:30:00 2025-05-05 12:00:00 Plant Tropisms: A Window on Computation and Actuation in Distributed Systems Plants solve complex navigational problems, continuously negotiating their unstructured and changing environment. They strategically redirect their growth to optimize photosynthesis in response to fluctuating light sources, while minimizing mechanical strains. While they have no brain or neural system, they can sense their environment, process sensory information, and plan strategic growth movements. Since plants are distributed systems, with no central control, underlying computational processes must be emergent properties of the tissue. In this talk I will give an overview of how plants accomplish this hierarchically at different scales: (i) decentralized computation at the tissue level, underpinning integration of sensory information over space and time, (ii) morphological computation at the organismal level, where plants capitalize on the interplay between active growth and passive mechanics in order to negotiate obstacles, and (iii) collective dynamics of crowded plants, at the group level. Physics (Building 202), Room 301 המחלקה לפיזיקה physics.dept@mail.biu.ac.il Asia/Jerusalem public
Place
Physics (Building 202), Room 301
Abstract

Plants solve complex navigational problems, continuously negotiating their unstructured and changing environment. They strategically redirect their growth to optimize photosynthesis in response to fluctuating light sources, while minimizing mechanical strains. While they have no brain or neural system, they can sense their environment, process sensory information, and plan strategic growth movements. Since plants are distributed systems, with no central control, underlying computational processes must be emergent properties of the tissue. In this talk I will give an overview of how plants accomplish this hierarchically at different scales: (i) decentralized computation at the tissue level, underpinning integration of sensory information over space and time, (ii) morphological computation at the organismal level, where plants capitalize on the interplay between active growth and passive mechanics in order to negotiate obstacles, and (iii) collective dynamics of crowded plants, at the group level.

תאריך עדכון אחרון : 21/04/2025