DARPA Offers No Food for Thought

frank249 writes "Wired News has an article outlining the US Defense Advanced Research Projects agency's (DARPA) research into ways to keep soldiers fighting for up to 5 days without food. The DARPA project, called 'Metabolic Dominance' or 'peak soldier performance' is part of a wider, future-facing Pentagon research push to develop grunts who are pretty much immune to normal human demands. Perhaps they should call this the Universal Soldier project?"

Comments

Pssst. Oh yeah, that's the stuff.

[numbski]

Ready commander?

LOL, sorry I now have Starcraft marines running through my head. Stimpacks and all.

Nothing scarier than a mob of stimmed marines with range and strength enhancements. ;)

Actually, I'm lying. A similar sized mob of zealots. *shivers* ...wait a sec.... *looks around* A mob of zealots! Aaaiiii!

*run away*

I'd call it Meth

[Anonymous Coward]

But I'm sure the DARPA solution will be much more expensive.

Millitary app?

[Jedi1USA]

"So Darpa, the U.S. military's far-out research arm, wants scientists to figure out if soldiers can operate at top levels -- without lunch breaks."

Sounds like my job requirements.

Beta testers ready!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

LATEST NEWS: Dolph Lundgren and Van Damme have both said yes to become beta testers.

HEROIN

[MancunianMaskMan]

AFAIK the germans developed something like this in the last century, they called it the drug of heroes, or HEROIN. It didn't turn out to be awefully useful but still is a commercial success.

As an ex 11B

[SLot]

I can say with authority that we were already asked to do things that were beyond normal human demands.

And I wouldn't exactly call MRE's 'food' anyways, although some of them weren't bad as long as you had hot sauce. :)

Grant takes Richmond with a Hoagie

[malia8888]

From the article: center has also funded research into transdermal patches that would deliver nutrients, just as nicotine patches give ex-smokers their fixes.

Great, now our military goes to war with a sandwich strapped to their buttocks. Where is the dignity in that?

Re:Bad news

[Winkhorst]

The Germans pioneered in this research during World War II. They called it "benzedrine."

There are more pressing needs first

[Anonymous Coward]

Teach them how to maintain peace, not war.

Seriously, if the US had more civil protection training, Iraq would be a safer place.

This isn't a rant against anyone in the US armed forces - they don't get to choose their training, and I'm certain no-one in the US forces would tell them their troops are so poorly trained in those areas.

Spending billions on finding ways to stop soldiers pooing and getting hungry isn't going to stop people suicide-bombing checkpoints next month. Decent training for the job at hand will, however.

You can't solve problems by throwing money at them.

(ps. posting AC as you can never tell how USans react when discussing their armed forces - no offense)

Re:Think of the uses!

[NtwoO]

During the '80s the South African government was fighting a war in Angola. The special opps teams were supplied with very strong tablets of speed to keep on going for DAYS. They were said to keep on marching with no desire for food.

I wonder if they also had a walkman with some heavy trance running...

Obvious non-military applications

[Futaba-chan]

While this research is for the military for use on the front lines, there's some definite non-military value to this, if it's at all feasible. I do a lot of "ultralight" backpacking, in which one strives to keep the weight that one carries below ten kilograms -- less, if it can be managed. Even when carrying "dense" high-energy foods, meals for one day on the trail take 1 1/2-2 pounds, and on very long and arduous trips such as thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail, it becomes difficult or impossible to carry enough nutrition to replace what you're burning. Even if all that came out of this effort were higher-calorie rations for less weight, that would really help, assuming that the cost could be kept down enough.

Even more importantly, this could be useful in disaster relief situations, especially where the transportation infrastructure is damaged or there's still a dangerous condition that limits the number or type of vehicles that can get in to the affected area. A helicopter or a HMMWV or an armored vehicle could be used to carry emergency supplies to the victims of a disaster, or to beseiged civilians in a war zone.

Need for fatter soldiers?

[G4from128k]

Although DARPA might rejigger people's appetites and metabolism to avoid the need for food, they can't avoid the the physical constraints of conservation of energy. Even if a soldier is just waiting in a fox hole, they need 2000 calories per day of energy. If the fighting is intense (the time when no eating is possible) then they might need more tha 5000 calories per day of energy.

This means a soldiers needs between 10,000 and 25,000 of energy reserves for a 5-day stint. This means that these soldiers wil need 3 to 7 pounds of excess body fat (more if the soldiers is expected to last several rounds of 5-day food deprivation). Without excess body fat, the body will start mateabolizing muscle tissue and that won't be very good for military readiness.

Maybe all those overweight American kids might make good soldiers after all.