Scientists have created a cyborg rose, making it the first ever product that combines electronics and living plants.
Through this synergy, researchers can further study the biological systems of plants and see how else it could come useful in plenty of research fields.
The rose is embedded with an electronic polymer scientists called PEDOT-S. Once it was sucked into the rose's system, the polymers "grew" into a circuitry by following the natural internal structure of the plant, and, with the existence of electrolytes, made it easier for the circuit to function and serve as a transistor.
"In a sense, the plant is helping to organize the electronic devices," said Magnus Berggren, co-author of the study and an organic electronics researcher at Linköping University in Sweden, according to Live Science.
"Now we can really start talking about 'power plants' - we can place sensors in plants and use the energy formed in the chlorophyll, produce green antennas, or produce new materials. Everything occurs naturally, and we use the plants' own very advanced, unique systems," Berggren added, according to Inquisitr.
While it's unlikely that your next computer will be grown, this kind of technology is hugely exciting for ecologists and plant biologists because it is now possible to monitor the activities of plants in a more intimate level - kind of like how we are able to study the human heart and brain, Popular Science reported.
Researchers at the university had been working on embedding electronics into plants for more than 20 years already, the first attempt of which was in 1990, when they tried but failed to make trees accept electronic circuitry.
The study was published in Nov. 6 issue of the journal Science Advances.
