Publisher Correction: Questioning life.

In the version of this Feature originally published, an older standfirst was used by mistake; it should have read 'Art-based absurd scenarios serve as a vector to challenge perceptions of emergent biotechnologies.' The author's affiliation was missing 'School of Human Sciences'; it should have read 'SymbioticA, Centre of Excellence for Biological Arts, School of Human Sciences, University of Western Australia, Perth, Western Australia, Australia'. The author also wishes to add, after 'For example, cellF is a collaborative project', the following text '(with artists Nathan Thompson, Andrew Fitch and Darren Moore, and scientists Stuart Hodgetts, Mike Edel and Douglas Bakkum)'.

MEART: The Semi-Living Artist.

Here, we and others describe an unusual neurorobotic project, a merging of art and science called MEART, the semi-living artist. We built a pneumatically actuated robotic arm to create drawings, as controlled by a living network of neurons from rat cortex grown on a multi-electrode array (MEA). Such embodied cultured networks formed a real-time closed-loop system which could now behave and receive electrical stimulation as feedback on its behavior.

Embodying cultured networks with a robotic drawing arm.

The advanced and robust computational power of the brain is shown by the complex behaviors it produces. By embodying living cultured neuronal networks with a robotic or simulated animal (animat) and situating them within an environment, we study how the basic principles of neuronal network communication can culminate into adaptive goal-directed behavior. We engineered a closed-loop biological-robotic drawing machine and explored sensory-motor mappings and training.