UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Back when they were both undergraduate Penn State students, best friends Frank Barbano and Nathan Leo knew they worked well together, but they never knew how powerful their friendship could be until they joined together to form a Nittany AI Challenge team.

"We worked together on a project in the past, we made a DJ stand in a week,” said Leo, who graduated in the spring of 2024 with a bachelor of science in engineering science from the College of Engineering and is now working toward a doctoral degree in the same field. “It was pretty cool. After that project, I thought we could work together on something big.”

That something big turned out to be Project Green Thumb, an application to help builders, homeowners and landscapers plant and maintain native, eco-friendly landscapes that support wildlife. The idea combined Leo’s technical skills and interest in artificial intelligence (AI) with Barbano’s knowledge as a 2023 graduate with a degree in landscape contracting from the College of Agricultural Sciences.

Together, they formed a team and entered Project Green Thumb into the Nittany AI Challenge, the annual competition hosted by the Nittany AI Alliance that provides students in all majors the opportunity to address pressing global issues and build solutions using AI and machine learning while gaining hands-on experience.

At the conclusion of the last phase of the Nittany AI Challenge, Project Green Thumb took home the first ever Vishwamitra AI Geography Award, which was funded by the GeoEd Foundation for projects that included aspects of geo-literacy.

Prithvi Narayanan serves as the project’s liaison from the GeoEd Foundation, which has continued to support Project Green Thumb a total of $10,000 to continue its development.

"Project Green Thumb champions geography and technology's intersection through the development of an application to bring native plant species back into our backyards. The GeoEd Foundation has always been committed to the promotion of geo-literacy — to use geographic knowledge to tackle obstacles with ingenuity and expand the scope of what is possible,” Narayanan said. “We are immensely proud to support the Project Green Thumb team with the Vishwamitra AI Award. The team's application will enable individuals to consider their role in environmental stewardship and act accordingly to further healthy ecosystems. Project Green Thumb epitomizes the spirit of the GeoEd Foundation as the team utilizes geography to reimagine."

With the continued support of the Nittany AI Alliance and the GeoEd Foundation, Barbano and Leo said they hope to launch a product in 2025.

“Our main goal is to inform everybody worldwide to plant native plants in areas where you are not using your grass and to have companies actually incorporate native plants into their landscaping,” Leo said. “We also just want to inform everyone about ecosystems. We get so caught up in our technology that we forget that without the earth we live on, we might die if we continue to ruin it. This is a solution that we see to help with global warming and the carbon problems we see in the entire world.”

According to Barbano, using native plants in yards can help homeowners reduce maintenance costs and water usage, all while providing an eco-friendly landscape that will support local wildlife.

“If just 10% of Pennsylvania households incorporated native plants into their landscaping, it could create 500,000 new habitats for local wildlife and pollinators,” said Barbano. Many homeowners struggle to identify and find native plants for their landscaping, he added; that's where Project Green Thumb comes in.

The application will allow users to scan a landscape with their phone while an AI model will suggest the most appropriate native plants for the area. The goal is to help them visualize the landscape they can create and provide access to resources needed to plant and maintain it.

As they continue to finalize the application, Leo said the support of the Nittany AI Alliance has made an idea that was sparked by friendship into something that continues to grow.

“The Nittany AI Challenge is an amazing opportunity actually to be an entrepreneur and make your idea come to life with all of the resources they have available,” Leo said. “You have industry experts everywhere, funding opportunities everywhere. Through the alliance you have vast resources that I wish more students knew about.”

Teams are currently forming for the 2024-2025 Nittany AI Challenge. Information about how to get involved can be found here.

The Nittany AI Alliance is a Penn State Outreach program.