5 ms·

http://growbot.online http://growbot.online (GrowPotBot) YC W2018 is an open source positronic (AI) aeroponic residential and lightweight industrial gardenin

http://growbot.online http://growbot.online (GrowPotBot) YC W2018 is an open source positronic (AI) aeroponic residential and lightweight industrial gardening appliance. the tech stack fits into multiple platforms, we spent the last few years in China and Malaysia understanding value engineering, manufacturing logistics. we're hoping to ship in major retailers starting in 2020 with an incredibly low < $100 'in cabinet' unit that can produce peppers, tomatoes and cannabis (or whatever you want). the primary differentiator is the cost and intelligence of the unit targeted at high yield strains of food and medicine in small spaces. we're hoping to make them so cheap we can nearly give them away and make indoor urban farming "a thing" before climate change really kicks into full gear and destroys outdoor gardens. positronic "closed loop" garden, happy to share what we're working on with other like minded people and collaborating with other growers internationally on open-data standards for storing this data and compiled models.

thatcat 7y ago
Sounds like a very promising venture. I like that you're willing to share the data and are offering an intelligence unit. Have you thought of implementing experimental designs at scale? like you're intelligence unit could organize large scale controlled experiments on possible improvements in technique/process/genetics with willing participants. Since all the systems are controlled, closed loop, and use the same equipment a lot of variance that is present in typical ag experiments would be avoided. This combined with a high number of participants to replicate the experiment could offer a robust platform for rapid improvement via citizen science.
- elasticventures 7y ago
  Thanks @thatcat .. I need to credit micckey at Post Scarcity Robotics for the inspiration to collaborate, that's been my primary driver the last few months to find other people who are like minded and work with them. https://github.com/limikael/ideas/blob/master/PostScarcityRobotics.md https://github.com/limikael/ideas/blob/master/PostScarcityRo... My primary focus is on the scale, implementing something that is both safe, easy to operate (idiot proof) and environmentally friendly (negative carbon footprint). My goal is to be able to self realize an economy of scale as it pertains to my own AI/IA interests. Robotic assembly, etc. but not necessarily bringing it to foxconn -- at the same time secure enough that if you want to run it over tor and grow psychadelic cactus in the desert you can do that too -- although it will require loading your own custom software. I'm a 3rd generation farming family (in general ornamental agriculture) and I've been designing these systems myself for years. I expect humans to screw up this planet in the next 10-20 years and so these are what we'll need to survive in our bunkers; I don't want any shitty drm or anything. The AI is also a bit complex; but the goal is to allow the units to work together in a quorum for fault tolerance. I literally expect these devices to keep people alive, and hopefully eliminate food deserts at the same time.
peteradio 7y ago
> before climate change really kicks into full gear and destroys outdoor gardens Not sure what the case will be that you can sustain yourself on your apartment tomato while outdoors is Armageddon. Nice! Good luck with your marketing strategy!
- elasticventures 7y ago
  marketing strategy is key. The tech & science behind the yield optimization -- up to 6x 'overclocked photosynthesis' using aeroponics (not soil), optimized for photonic efficiency -- humans can accelerate the growth of plants substantially effectively "overlocking" nature. it's based on the Minskey/MIT media lab designs and some pieces I found in China -- a training gym for growing plants, but with a non-laboratory 'real world' implementation. also I don't think a single unit would be sufficient - not from a redundancy standpoint you'd want at least three for a 'quorum' and redundancy if life depended on it. otherwise it's a novelty -- but it's cheap enough everybody can afford one; and it has gamification to make it fun. it's a vegetable appliance "for your health" the idea is micro-to-macro scalable; you can start with one in your childs room, and the move it to the patio or the garage. the units themselves are designed to run for 100+ years -- and you can either connect to our cloud or run your own on some commodity hardware (like a raspberry pi). if the yields go up; with year round growing cycles and cloning mature plants it won't take a ton of vertical space. did I mention it also makes fresh air?
  - shoyer 7y ago
    I’d be careful before following the MIT media lab designs too carefully. Their agriculture project has been called “mostly smoke and mirrors”: https://www.businessinsider.com/mit-media-lab-personal-food-computers-dont-work-fake-staff-say-2019-9 https://www.businessinsider.com/mit-media-lab-personal-food-...
    - elasticventures 7y ago
      thanks @shoyer -- i'm not; but conceptually they were closest. By increasing the intensity of the light (in pulses) at specific frequencies in the 420nm growth & 700nm veg we can increase yield. Each light frequency causes a different type of growth inside the auxins part of a plants central nervous system. Photosynthesis is a chemical reaction and it works similar to a doped transistor pre-saturation when going from light to dark. This is why plants roughly grow the same on sunny and cloudy days despite having MORE energy on the sunny day. By controlling the nutrients; pulsing the light and watching the leaves we can build stronger chemical pathways inside the plant .. I'm calling these "cybernetic pathways" since it's organic plus artificial intelligence. The MIT work was funded (in part) by the world-class douche nozzle Jeffery Epstein as well; but studying that did inspire me so I feel like credit is due. MIT at the time also lacked the AI technology libraries we have today to make something cost effective anyway. Espressif Esp32 w/ov2640 cameras are so cheap!! I grew up in commercial agriculture; 3rd generation ornamental farmer & ag-scientist who dropped the family business of farming for the dot-com bubble yay "Internet" tech! This is me going back to my "roots" and teaching a positronic brain how to accelerate plant growth, so it scratches my AI & IOT itch at the same time. I showed my dad that MIT research as a kid and he called it crap told me the reasons it doesn't work "no soil" haha .. farmers don't like to change unless they need to which is why I'm not targeting farmers at all; instead a residential appliance which is "soil-less" allowing more efficient nutrient distribution and also allowing oxidation of the roots by disabling pumps. In China they use positive pressure on the root systems to actually force the fertilizer in -- haven't seen anything like that in the west. The soil in the US is almost dead; it's losing nutrients so fast due to over fertilization we need better solutions. Being from Southern California we had a lot of hyper water efficient indoor stealth growing in the Cannabis space. That's where most of the experience comes from -- but those guys (my friends) don't like to show off what they're doing. .. that's why this needs to be something that works anywhere.

thatcat 7y ago

Sounds like a very promising venture. I like that you're willing to share the data and are offering an intelligence unit. Have you thought of implementing experimental designs at scale? like you're intelligence unit could organize large scale controlled experiments on possible improvements in technique/process/genetics with willing participants. Since all the systems are controlled, closed loop, and use the same equipment a lot of variance that is present in typical ag experiments would be avoided. This combined with a high number of participants to replicate the experiment could offer a robust platform for rapid improvement via citizen science.

elasticventures 7y ago
Thanks @thatcat .. I need to credit micckey at Post Scarcity Robotics for the inspiration to collaborate, that's been my primary driver the last few months to find other people who are like minded and work with them. https://github.com/limikael/ideas/blob/master/PostScarcityRobotics.md https://github.com/limikael/ideas/blob/master/PostScarcityRo... My primary focus is on the scale, implementing something that is both safe, easy to operate (idiot proof) and environmentally friendly (negative carbon footprint). My goal is to be able to self realize an economy of scale as it pertains to my own AI/IA interests. Robotic assembly, etc. but not necessarily bringing it to foxconn -- at the same time secure enough that if you want to run it over tor and grow psychadelic cactus in the desert you can do that too -- although it will require loading your own custom software. I'm a 3rd generation farming family (in general ornamental agriculture) and I've been designing these systems myself for years. I expect humans to screw up this planet in the next 10-20 years and so these are what we'll need to survive in our bunkers; I don't want any shitty drm or anything. The AI is also a bit complex; but the goal is to allow the units to work together in a quorum for fault tolerance. I literally expect these devices to keep people alive, and hopefully eliminate food deserts at the same time.

peteradio 7y ago

> before climate change really kicks into full gear and destroys outdoor gardens Not sure what the case will be that you can sustain yourself on your apartment tomato while outdoors is Armageddon. Nice! Good luck with your marketing strategy!

elasticventures 7y ago
marketing strategy is key. The tech & science behind the yield optimization -- up to 6x 'overclocked photosynthesis' using aeroponics (not soil), optimized for photonic efficiency -- humans can accelerate the growth of plants substantially effectively "overlocking" nature. it's based on the Minskey/MIT media lab designs and some pieces I found in China -- a training gym for growing plants, but with a non-laboratory 'real world' implementation. also I don't think a single unit would be sufficient - not from a redundancy standpoint you'd want at least three for a 'quorum' and redundancy if life depended on it. otherwise it's a novelty -- but it's cheap enough everybody can afford one; and it has gamification to make it fun. it's a vegetable appliance "for your health" the idea is micro-to-macro scalable; you can start with one in your childs room, and the move it to the patio or the garage. the units themselves are designed to run for 100+ years -- and you can either connect to our cloud or run your own on some commodity hardware (like a raspberry pi). if the yields go up; with year round growing cycles and cloning mature plants it won't take a ton of vertical space. did I mention it also makes fresh air?
- shoyer 7y ago
  I’d be careful before following the MIT media lab designs too carefully. Their agriculture project has been called “mostly smoke and mirrors”: https://www.businessinsider.com/mit-media-lab-personal-food-computers-dont-work-fake-staff-say-2019-9 https://www.businessinsider.com/mit-media-lab-personal-food-...
  - elasticventures 7y ago
    thanks @shoyer -- i'm not; but conceptually they were closest. By increasing the intensity of the light (in pulses) at specific frequencies in the 420nm growth & 700nm veg we can increase yield. Each light frequency causes a different type of growth inside the auxins part of a plants central nervous system. Photosynthesis is a chemical reaction and it works similar to a doped transistor pre-saturation when going from light to dark. This is why plants roughly grow the same on sunny and cloudy days despite having MORE energy on the sunny day. By controlling the nutrients; pulsing the light and watching the leaves we can build stronger chemical pathways inside the plant .. I'm calling these "cybernetic pathways" since it's organic plus artificial intelligence. The MIT work was funded (in part) by the world-class douche nozzle Jeffery Epstein as well; but studying that did inspire me so I feel like credit is due. MIT at the time also lacked the AI technology libraries we have today to make something cost effective anyway. Espressif Esp32 w/ov2640 cameras are so cheap!! I grew up in commercial agriculture; 3rd generation ornamental farmer & ag-scientist who dropped the family business of farming for the dot-com bubble yay "Internet" tech! This is me going back to my "roots" and teaching a positronic brain how to accelerate plant growth, so it scratches my AI & IOT itch at the same time. I showed my dad that MIT research as a kid and he called it crap told me the reasons it doesn't work "no soil" haha .. farmers don't like to change unless they need to which is why I'm not targeting farmers at all; instead a residential appliance which is "soil-less" allowing more efficient nutrient distribution and also allowing oxidation of the roots by disabling pumps. In China they use positive pressure on the root systems to actually force the fertilizer in -- haven't seen anything like that in the west. The soil in the US is almost dead; it's losing nutrients so fast due to over fertilization we need better solutions. Being from Southern California we had a lot of hyper water efficient indoor stealth growing in the Cannabis space. That's where most of the experience comes from -- but those guys (my friends) don't like to show off what they're doing. .. that's why this needs to be something that works anywhere.