On the other side of the US, in a repurposed seventy-thousand-square-foot factory in Newark, New Jersey, a company called AeroFarms has figured out how to grow over 2 million pounds of leafy greens a year with neither sun nor soil. Instead, inside their facility, rows of AI-controlled LEDs provide the exact wavelength of light each plant needs to thrive. Using aeroponics, nutrients are misted directly onto the plants’ roots, so no soil is required. Rather, plants are suspended in a growth mesh fabric made from recycled water bottles. And here too, sensors, cameras, and machine learning govern
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