ABSTRACT

Urban overpopulation, climate change and natural resources decrement are threatening food security. Ensuring season-less, accessible and local food production promotes a sustainable agriculture. Valencia_UPV provides a whole new system to control plant physiology at both genetic and environmental level.

ChatterPlant is a SynBio-based solution that works as plant-human interface allowing a bidirectional communication. First, a root-specific modular optogenetic circuit enables control on plants´ endogenous gene expression (e.g flowering). Then, a sensor circuit with color coded output provides specific information of stress conditions, accelerating corrective measures. The genetic setup is complemented with a hardware device, ChatterBox, specially designed to control plant’s growth conditions.

ChatterPlant’s possibilities can be improved gathering Plant SynBio knowledge. PlantLabCo is an open-access online platform which aims to unify Plant SynBio researchers’ work. Individual results can be published, supported by a modeling software tool integrated to ease the mathematical models’ generation of genetic circuits.

APPLIED DESIGN

ChatterPlant proposes an elegant and innovative solution to cover present and future agriculture needs.

PLANTSYNBIO

A genetic interface enables a bidirectional human-plant communication designing a modular optogenetic circuit and a color sensor system in plant chassis.

MODELING

In our modeling, we focused on understanding and optimizing Chatterplant performance ensuring a smooth communication between plants and humans.

HARDWARE

ChatterBox resulted from combining control over climatic conditions and SynBio with the objective of increasing sustainability.

SOFTWARE

PlantLabCo is PlantSynBio's divulgation website, where we created a standard for information and tools for synthetic biology in plants.

HUMAN PRACTICES

Several studies provided us with the information for development and integration of Chatterplant in the society.