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Stretchy Wires to Create Artificial Nerves
Roland Piquepaille writes "Researchers from the Johns Hopkins University have built electronic circuits which exhibit a rubbery behavior. The flexible circuits, built by using gold springs, can stretch like rubber. And Nature says that these stretchy wires can be used to create artificial nerves bending inside our bodies or wearable electronics. 'Wiring like this could be woven into stretchy sports clothing and used to connect up sensors that monitor athletic performance. Rubbery electrodes made from biocompatible materials might be attached to a beating heart and used to sense impending problems.' This overview contains more details and references about these flexible wires."
Ummm how about we use this to monitor all the athleets to see if any are using "performance enhancing drugs". it's a monitoring not enhancing thing
A psychopath can't tell the difference between right and wrong. A sociopath knows the difference - he just doesn't care.
Excersize control: imagine your DVD playing the workout tape, and a machine monitoring your muscles as you work out. The DVD says "You need to work harder on your abs, the muscles aren't working hard enough". THAT would be cool. I know I could use it.
Nobodies Prefect
Tidbits for Techs Technology Blog
Most devices/machines today depend heavily on a motors/engines/circuits that are not usually flexible and need to maintain a rigid structure. Sure, we try to cover/encapsulate these devices in a pleasing exterior (car bodies, plastic casings etc) in order to protect the hardware and us from the dangerous interiors.
Imagine cars made up of soft cushiony/rubbery material, which bounces back to absorb a collision...the metal body can dent in and absorb the force of the impact, but it works only against collisions against other cars/hard objects -- not against collisions with humans/animals and other "soft" substances.
Ofcourse, we could have a soft covering for cars, made of a cushiony substance, but the problem has been embedding circuits/machinery in the soft exteriors, because they tend to bend and damage the interiors.
Nature has found the perfect way to create organs/pumps/filters/wires which are made out of soft tissue, and is malleable enough to survive severe tension/distortion and bending.
Here's to hoping that one day we will be able to create soft fuzzy machines which won't be so hard on our water-bag bodies.
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
Seriously though, this sounds fine for integrating electronics into fabrics, but the "artificial nerve" idea conjures images on Christopher Reeve leaping up and tap dancing. This invention doesn't sound like it has any therapeutic uses that a normal wire doesn't. Perhaps users of vagus nerve stimulators or other devices requiring in vivo wiring could be a little more physically vigorous without worrying about things pulling or breaking... but I have my doubts about even that.
One kink and it's trash can city.
Sweet informative mod.
From the article:
"the researchers estimate that the wires should be able to withstand several thousand cycles of extension and contraction."
That's no where NEAR what would be needed for any of the applications they mention. For example, at 70 beats per minute your heart beats 100,800 times per day. Assuming each step a runner takes covers 3 feet (very approximate here), then a "cycle" (back to starting configuration) is 6 ft. That's 880 "cycles" per mile. A single 6 mile run is therefore over 5000 cycles.
Several thousand "cycles of extension and contraction" is not even close to enough for any real world app. Who wants to have that internal heart monitor replaced several times each day? How about that high-tech single use "smart" sweatshirt?
These will need to be in the 100's of thousands to millions of cycles for their lifespan before they have any real utility.
Life is short: void the warranty.
Hmm, I could see this as a BIG thing for social studies, however. Sure, from a required standpoint it's horrible, but it'd never fly. From a science standpoint.
I'd love to see experiments done where volunteers wear clothing (shoes, hats, socks, pants, underwear, shirts) with this type of thing embedded to collect data. This could be SO useful...
* Wear and tear points in clothing. Wear do different clothing styles rub against someone, potentially uncomfortably, depending on the body shape and size.
* hot/cold comfort... Where does the wearer get hotter, colder based on wear of certain overcoats, garments and standard clothing
* posture studies... how do people really sit, stand, skip and run? once again, by body shape, age, race, culture, locale
* interaction studies... check for nervousness and pulse rate and the like based on social interaction. This could be done with wires and straps and such, but those things also impose tehmselves on wearers. THis could be done "on the sly" like the driving studies about how much people pay attention, when they THINK it's about seeing how they react to traffic and road conditions. (can't find a link... if someone knows of one, post it... interesting read).
I'm sure there are many other ideas out there for such things in the study of human nature. This is a tpoic that gets overlooked far too often.