personal food computers
“
THERE IS A GROUNDSWELL OF CONSUMERS
AND YOUNG INNOVATORS THAT WOULD LIKE
TO MAKE A BIG DIFFERENCE. ALL WE
NEED IS THE TOOLS. MY FOCUS IS
GETTING THOSE TOOLS OUT THERE.”
Meet Caleb Harper
Caleb Harper is a Renaissance man. He is an engineer,
architect, innovator, and research scientist at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Harper is
also the creator of the burgeoning PFC industry. Working
out of MIT’s iconic Media Lab and heading up the City
Farm Research Group in Cambridge, Massachusetts,
Harper and friends have developed the Open Agriculture
Initiative, or OpenAg.
The Open Agriculture Initiative
Their website describes the project in this way: “OpenAg
brings together partners from industry, government,
and academia in a research collective that’s creating
collaborative tools and open technology platforms for the
exploration of future food systems.”
One of those food systems in the works is the PFC.
At its heart, the PFC is a personal garden in a box.
Tabletop sized, it is an amalgamation of vertical farming,
hydro, and aeroponics, all integrated into an agricultural
Internet of Things platform replete with banks of
environmental sensors.
This innovative indoor gardening method allows for a vast
variety of plants and vegetables, along with other foods like
herbs, to be grown within a controlled environment requir-
ing only the basics of light, food, and water in a soilless
medium. The roots are fed via a nutritional mist, and the
light is provided by LEDs.
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