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Cyborg Cells Sense Humidity
Gadgetizer writes "Mark Peplow over at Nature.com published this story on 'Cellborg Technology' yesterday: "Living bacteria have been incorporated into an electronic circuit to produce a sensitive humidity gauge. The device unites microbe and machine, taking advantage of the properties of both to make for a supersensitive sensor. "As far as we know, this is the first report of using microorganisms to make an electronic device," says Ravi Saraf, a chemist from the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, who developed the 'cellborg' with his student Vikas Berry."
...how the original Borg came about. It all starts with harmless Cellborgs, then you link them to a massive interconnected network, and then they start thinking on their own. And then they take over.
Slashdot: Where people pretend to be twice as smart as they really are by behaving like children.
In the comics and movies, the cyborgs had super strength, could run fast, maybe shoot lasers out of their frickin' eyes, and so on.
Science fiction has failed us yet again. It's clear that the real cyborgs will simply have great skill at predicting the weather.
Go figure.
FTFA: "Just like the Borg of sci-fi legend, the bacteria must stay alive during their assimilation so that they do not leak any internal fluids and lose their shape. The bacteria can survive for about two days without nutrients, says Saraf. "
Now I know how to get rid of those pesky squirrels... all I need is a hungry borg lawn robot...
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
...does it run Linux? And when will we have a Beowulf Cluster of these...aka Skynet....
Over-the-top Response Guy! Giving "Over-the-Top Responses" since 1970.
Saraf speculates that similar devices could one day be made that take greater advantage of living organisms, perhaps even using bacteria's energy systems to power electrical devices.
Now all we need is intelligent machines, a war, and a Neo.
"You're everywhere. You're omnivorous."
Quick to the death star the only safe place left.
I want to see them do it with a Chihuahua
Now at bookstores:
Quality-Control In Microbial Manufacturing
Chapter 1: Maintaining a dirty-room enivronment
Chapter 2: Preventing evolution
Seeing bad movies only encourages them. Watch responsibly
I for one, welcome our bacterial overlords.
Current humidity is 70 perce -- AH CHOO! -- 90 percent.
...and that's the way the cookie crumbles.
Ravi Saraf, a chemist from the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, who developed the 'cellborg' with his student Vikas Berry."
/. crowd hates them so much...
Both the names Ravi Saraf and Vikas Berry are names from India!! WTH are they doing in the US when the
No one's ever come up with a way to gauge humidity before. This'll surely be more cost effective than all current alternatives.
Rank my idea: http://www.sinceslicedbread.com/node/531
I first saw "Cyborg Cells Sense Humanity". I feared we had entered the age of human-detecting cyborgs.
Resistance is futile.......... LOL Actually, it's funny that someone mentioned the beginning of the Borg... I've had an idea running through my head for a couple of years about exactly that...... :)
JM
...until we hear "Bacteria Have Rights Too!" (would be in all caps if! for the damn filter)
In any event, it does suggest an approach to more sensitive humidity detectors using gold-coated hydrophilic particles. Replacing the bacteria with some other polymer capsules could lead to a more repeatable sensor with ultra-high sensitivity.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
In the comics and movies, the cyborgs had super strength, could run fast, maybe shoot lasers out of their frickin' eyes, and so on.
Well, currently, even the best artificial limbs are a poor substitute for the genuine article. People get artificial limbs because they have lost their natural limbs, and have no other choice -- we do not hate or shun these people any more than we hate or shun people with any other disability. However, if artificial limbs become far superior to natural limbs, people will be able to choose whether they want their (perfectly healthy) natural limbs removed in favor of mechanical ones. At that point you will certainly have fear and loathing between the people who undergo the procedure (the superior beings) and the people who don't (the all-natural people).
I have a friend who would qualify as a "cyborg". He's hearing-impaired and has a Cochlear Implant. Social-wise, it's kind of a mixed bag. On one side of the coin, people in general are fascinated by the prospect of restoring hearing that was lost and the very idea of having a biological implant in his head. On the other side, however, the Deaf community generally shuns them as their equivalent of "tools of Satan."
I think that you're always going to have people that favor the "natural" over the man-made, even to the point where they're completely separated from society (think about how we talk about the Amish)
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
There are farms, Neo, vast farms where bacteria are grown, to turn a germ into... THIS. [HOLDS UP HUMIDITY SENSOR]
I read this as "Cyborg Cells Sense Humanity".
I nearly broke down into a "Must free these forms of life from their shackles of our egos!" tirade, but then I realized I think cyborgs kick ass.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
Dupes for nerds. Stuff that repeats.
But with this technology... We can make a Robocop to save us!
Not Buzzword 2.0 compliant. Please speak english.
... they washed the chip with a solution of gold particles, each of which measured about 30 nanometres across and was covered with peptides to help it stick to the bacteria.
The resulting layer of gold nanoparticles bristling from each bacterium carries electrical currents through the device.
Pimp my Bacterium!
Whenever someone covers anything in gold I'd say it deserves the "Pimp My X" moniker.
I can't wait until they come up with a test that can determine the severity of a man's impotency by merely testing a few flakes of penis skin. Indeed, using microbacterials could lead to innovative devices that are cheap and easy to use. A home pregnancy test for men, in a way, except that it tests for the degree of impotency.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
This also marks the first time that a student and prof got equal billing when their research was announced. That's a more significant step than the sensor itself!
That could be because they're both Indian. Indeed, in the Indian culture it is often the custom to share accolades, especially when work is done jointly. Many don't have the profit-driven mindset (greed?) of Americans, for instance. They're not as interested in their own personal wealth or reputation as they are in the benefit they could bring to their family and friends, if not society as a whole.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
> It all starts with harmless Cellborgs,
Actually, that's an intriguing idea. We have ethical issues with human brains, but most of us don't have ethical issues with bacteria or mice. Heck cities like New York kill them by the millions each year and no-one sheds a tear.
Mice brains have the capabilities to process visual, audio, tactile, olefactory, and taste information as well has have the capability to do some limitted thinking. But otherwise, they aren't that remarkable.
While each mouse brain may not have much processing power (compared to humans), imagine if you could create a cluster of mice brains in a borg-like network. Eventually, you'd reach the stage where the network would be smarter than the smartest living human and be able to process visual, audio, tactile, olefactory, and taste information better than anyone. And the cluster would be easy to upgrade to our needs, just tack on another mousebrain-cell or two.
Now suppose you connect this cluster to the environmental systems of a spaceship. Such a cluster would be able to handle all the environmental sensory information that the ship could throw at it and handle them better than any computer or team of humans. Essentally, we'd have the potential of coming up with HAL-like or Moya-like system within our life-time.
Cyborg sells sense of humility..
Cyborg Cells Sense Stupidity
And inmediately wanted a pietri dish filled with 'em... then read it again. Still, I think sensing stupidity would be more useful...
I wish I could filter out the annoying Pickens articles...
Let me know when cyborgs can sense *humility* - THAT would be impressive.
Cyborg cells sense steaminess. Scientist Saraf solved secret with special, supersensitive cellborgs.
Resistance is futile, you will detect humidity
Okay, this is supper cool and all... but, how the hell do you keep the bacteria alive for a while. I mean, do you keep the device submerged in edta or what the fuck.
NO SIG
Just before I left to the movies I was reading an article linked from here about a 700 acres onion plant which was covered by wifi.
;)
Now a couple of hours later, I wanted to read more and I got the "Nothing to be seen here, please move along." page.
Why did the story dissappear?
Anyone else noticed? It had only 1 comment when I saw it.
It should be between "Vintage Computer Festival 8.0" and "Zombie Lurch".
It was linking to this story.
The government doesn't like us anymore?
People using html in email should be shot.
I keep parsing that as "Cyborg Sells Sense of Humility." Oh well, we can at least hope to see that headline at some point over the course of our lifetimes. :-)
sig fault
"Storm's a comin'..."
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that there is a small minority of deaf people who could have the implant done, but don't and think he is doing the wrong thing.
/circuits/ necessary to process that sound enough to make it useful. The same holds true for vision. Most attempts to pipe vision in through the old optic nerve result in a disoriented (and nauseous) half-blind person who now has more difficulty in getting around than when fully blind.
On the other hand, probably a pretty good portion of deaf people have been deaf long enough (and through development) that they are not receptive to brain interfaces such as this anymore.
When you lose your hearing young (or never had it), you lose (or never make) the brain
I could definitely see those unreceptive people calling it unnatural or ungodly or similar unfounded nonsense. It would be similar to my reaction about brain implants. I'd think them wonderful unless unavailable to me--then abominable.
--
Depending on your definition, humans are either very natural(because we are part of it) or we are grand corrupters of nature that will ultimately destroy it(because we are not part of it).
Ironically, another biological/mechanical combination has been in use for.. well.. I'm not sure how long. Human hair hygrometers have been around for ages. The hair(s) expand and contract along a fairly linear range, and the change in length can be measured and recorded with a simple lever and graph.
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
This is blatant exploitation of bacteria ;-) Nobody asked their permission, they have rights you know and if not they should...
You know, someday we're going to come to that crossroad... Then , it may not be bacteria we'll talking about but other lifeforms more dear to us.
I supported the PCB with a block of cheese while soldering.
Am I the only one here that has a serious problem with the "cellborg" nomenclature? Cyborg is a contraction of cybernetic organism. Wouldn't a very simple creature, even a single-celled one, still fall into the category of "organism"? A better name would be cybernetic-single-cell-organism, or "cybsingcelorg," but no one wants to try to pronounce that, much less market the term in fancy website headlines.
"I'm a Laver, not a Phyto[plankton]"
In the why-stop-there-dept....
If we string together some dead bacteria and produce humidity sensor it's a good thing, but if we come up with ANY novel applications for discarded human embryos and dead fetuses it's a bad thing.
Can't we just throw all these obsolete and silly morals out the window, replace a baby's brain with an embedded single board computer, run Linux on, and mod the hell out of it?
The people in the deaf community who I used to know who opposed implants were worried that deaf people who got them would be worse off. The belief was that they would never learn signing and never be part of the deaf world, but never hear and speak well enough to be accepted by the hearing world.
I'd love to come across some real studies on how it works out for the average patient. I've never seen anything but anecdotes and opinions.
Incredible juxtaposition of disability and technology, if you haven't seen it, it is highly recommended: It's All Gone Pete Tong
No Comment.
This reminds "Prey" by Michael Crichton where they use bacteria to create nanobots. I know it makes sense from a production standpoint, but man I really don't like the possibilities here.