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Through a combination of genetic engineering and modern electronics (with a dash of nanotech), enhance plants to provide a host of services.
Imagine a tree where every leaf can vibrate in response to a signal: you now have a living speaker system. Strawberries, blueberries, oranges, apples could
be made to light up (bioluminescent plants have been proposed, but what if you want to turn off the light?). Turn a weeping willow into an outdoor air conditioner by having it pump heat from its leaves to its roots. You get the idea.
(Home:Garden was as close as I could come as there is no Product:Plant catagory)
A similar speaker system...?
http://www.google.c...ystem+ever+built%22
[lubbit, Aug 21 2001]
[link]
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You're right [waugsqueke]. I forgot to mention 'and a wee bit o' pixie dust'. |
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Hadn't thought about until just now, but don't plants that move--Venus flytrap, bladderwort, sensitive plant--achieve motion by essentially hydraulic means rather than by tendons attached to contractile actuators? Point being, very fast and immediately reversible movements might not be achievable using plants' natural physiology. |
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Neat topic for speculative armchair engineering, though, phoenix. Plants' stringy vascular structures, like the strings in a celery stalk, might be adaptable as tendons--especially if one could convince the plant to double up, growing one tube that can slide inside another, like a bicycle cable in its sheath. And if we could coerce the plant into producing cells containing contractile polymers, pretty soon we'd have a true vegetable muscle system. |
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Your weeping-willow air conditioner is more likely, imho--I mean, lay down on a grassy lawn and the grass feels cool because it's doing some evaporative cooling already, losing liquid through its stomata. More like a swamp cooler than a heat pump, but hey it's getting close. |
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waugsqueke's right to cry wibni, perhaps, but...oh let's just play with it for a while? |
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how about tigerism and custardic engineering,waugsqueke? |
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That's exactly it [UnaBubba]! |
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Create a plant with chrome leaf surfaces and have it change position with the sun - ensuring you tan evenly. |
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Boned for genetic engineering AND nanotech. |
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