Carrol Plummer: Vivent Biosignals

Carrol Plummer is the CEO and Co-Founder of Vivent Biosignals, a Swiss-based scaleup tapping into plant signalling networks to get key insights into what plants need to grow well. Plants sense and respond to many changes in their environment, both above and below ground, Vivent Biosignals records electrical signals from plants and uses artificial intelligence to decipher them, helping provide crop health insights direct from the plant. Through their innovative plant alert system, Vivent Biosignals helps food producer and growers to increase yield by limiting the stresses placed on the plant and ensuring optimal conditions for growth.

The process can diagnose soil pests, unwanted insects, fungal and bacterial infections, water stress and nutrient deficiencies, enabling food producers and growers to manage their use of chemical fertilisers and crop protection products more efficiently. Importantly, this reduces greenhouse gas emissions and nitrogen pollution limiting the impacts of these products on the climate, biodiversity, soil, water and crop safety.

Vivent Biosignals also works with farmers to grow food that is more resilient to climate change and extreme weather events.