In 2020, Michael Levin and his team at Tufts University introduced xenobots: small synthetic organisms created from embryonic frog skin cells. The cells form unique body shapes, resulting in behaviors that bear little resemblance to a frog’s.

This kind of novel life system—one unconstrained by traditional frameworks of biological development—might provide the key to understanding intelligence in the universe. In this project, the team will use xenobots, which have no brains or nerve cells, to study how a primitive mind emerges in an unconventional body. The project also seeks to communicate with xenobots to develop a framework for understanding novel intelligences of all types.

Through the project, the team seeks to create a powerful model to address a long-standing question in philosophy of mind: How does a single, integrated intelligence arise from a collection of cells, with memories and goals belonging to the collective but not to any individual cell? This investigation will impact the fundamental understanding of embodied cognition as well as drive practical advances in regenerative medicine, swarm robotics, and AI.

Photograph of xenobots by Douglas Blackiston and Sam Kriegman released under CC BY 4.0