EarthTalk mushroom icon

Welcome to EarthTalk

EarthTalk is an open research project documenting electrical activity in living fungal networks. I measure bioelectrical signals from mycelium using simple instrumentation to characterize observed patterns.

I'm exploring whether fungal electrical signals can reveal something about how fungal networks function. The long-term vision I'm curious about is whether we could build a fungal data layer, a way to read signals from soil, plants, and ecosystems through mycelial electrical activity. I work from the hypothesis that fungal networks might be a biological analogue to nervous systems, and I'm documenting what I observe to see where this exploration leads.

This workspace is my evolving lab notebook, protocol archive, and thinking engine.

Research Scope

I'm currently studying electrical signals measured directly from living fungal mycelium. I am observing temporal patterns in bioelectrical activity, how signals vary spatially across networks, and any correlations between environmental conditions and what I measure. I'm documenting instrumentation methods and publishing my observations here.

For full research history, click here.

Want to contribute? Start below:

🧭 Where to Start

1. Explore the Experiments

👉 Experiment Digest

My experiments, the analysis that came out of them, what I think the results mean, the questions they open up, and the backlog of future tests.

2. Thoughts & Ideas

⚙️ Journal Entries

Private notes, summarized by AI or developed through a conversation with AI - to help me track the evolution of my thinking over time. Raw, but hopefully organized enough to see the progression.

3. Use the Open Protocols

🔓 Open Protocols

Step-by-step guides for setup, equipment, and code. If you want to replicate my work or run your own experiments, start here.

4. Education

📚 What I'm Learning

📖 What I'm Reading

This is the knowledge I'm building in parallel with the experiments. If you're curious, you can follow along, ask questions, or start discussions.

🧪 Contribute to EarthTalk

Do you want to collaborate? Would love to connect with:

  • Experimenters running fungal blocks or AMF tests
  • Hardware & sensing engineers
  • Researchers validating signals
  • Data scientists exploring patterns
  • Curious minds who want to learn by doing

To join:

  1. Read a protocol
  2. Run your first measurement
  3. Share your data or findings via Notion, GitHub, or email

If you ran an experiment - whether it worked or didn't - please share it. Every result moves the science forward.

🧰 Tools & Methods

Measurement instruments

I try to keep things simple, measurable, and reproducible:

  • ESP32 microcontrollers
  • ADS1115 analog-to-digital converters
  • Acupuncture needles + alligator clips (as electrodes)
  • InfluxDB + CSV logging + Python
  • This page as the open R&D HQ

Don't assume anything and verify everything.

Data representation

EarthTalk recordings follow a minimal data representation approach.

Measurements are represented using FEDS (Fungal Electrophysiology Data Structure). Learn more about the FEDS standard.

Shared research infrastructure

To lower friction for early contributors, I've made a limited, shared lab environment available for exploratory use.

This includes basic plotting utilities and a temporary logging setup for raw electrophysiological data, intended only to support early-stage experimentation.

Participation does not require use of shared infrastructure, and no analysis, interpretation, or conclusions are centralized.

Access the shared lab environment.

Notes on Variability and Limitations

  • Electrical recordings vary across fungal species, substrates, and growth conditions.
  • Environmental factors such as temperature, humidity, and moisture can influence measurements.
  • Long-duration recordings may exhibit drift, noise, or baseline shifts related to instrumentation.
  • Observed signal changes are descriptive and do not imply biological states, functions, or intent.
  • Interpretation of patterns remains an open research question and is not assumed at this stage.

📬 Contact

Thoughts, insights, or collaboration ideas?

👤 Who Am I?

I'm Moshe Lokshin, nobody in particular - just someone with a deep curiosity and a long pull toward fungi who finally found the time and space to explore it. This work feels meaningful, I'm learning a lot, and I'm having a lot of fun. Talk to you soon.

Cheers Moshe

✍️ Note on the Writing Style

I'm not a professional writer, and most of my early notes are messy, nonlinear, and full of typos. To make this more useful for others, I've run much of the content here through ChatGPT to make it clearer and more inviting for new contributors.

This project is about building signal, not showing off polish. If something sounds well-written, it's probably AI-assisted. If it's rough, it's probably me.

Either way, the goal is the same: clarity, compounding research, and progress.