If you walked onto the grounds of the World Food Programme’s (WFP) country office in Amman last week, you would have been met with a team of innovators from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). 

You would have also been struck by a vibrant energy surrounding the young technicians, purposefully moving around WFP’s outdoor meeting rooms to put together what looks like a machine that came out of a Sci-Fi movie.

Caleb Harper, director of the MIT Media Lab Open Agriculture, has created a computer that grows food using the hydroponic cultivation technique.