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Super-Strong Synthetic Muscles Developed
Too Hot! wrote to mention a BBC article about extremely powerful synthetic muscles. From the article: "The most powerful type, 'shorted fuel cell muscles' convert chemical energy into heat, causing a special shape-memory metal alloy to contract. Turning down the heat allows the muscle to relax. Lab tests showed that these devices had a lifting strength more than 100 times that of normal skeletal muscle. Another kind of muscle being developed by the team converted chemical energy into electrical energy which caused a material made from carbon nanotube electrodes to bend."
Bye bye heavy and clumsy robots?
Myomer bundles are nice but until KF drives are developed meh.
__
Funy PORN videos @ Laugh DAILY.
I for one welcome our new mechwarrior overlords.
Good news for grand dad...viagra was putting a big strain on the budget last 4-5 years
Scientists have developed artificial, super-strength muscles which are powered by alcohol and hydrogen.
I for one welcome our new Bender overlords.
For some reason Barry Bonds comes to mind when I read the article subject. AS skewed as the sports playing field is now I shudder to think what things might be like once the 'designers' get a hold of something like this. The Tour de France in one day?
I'm still trying to make up my mind to decide whether this is awesome or frightening. Both, I guess. Because there are so obviously enormous benefits. But on the other hand, when you've grown up on Marvel comics, then any mention of superhuman strength makes me wonder about the potential problems.
Fancy imagining that kind of technology in the hands of some warlord in a third world country somewhere? Or even in a normal army? I'm not sure it's something I really want to envision.
Meaning all of us. I hope we start abandoning our evolved bodies soon. What we'll become will make what we are now seem quite disabled.
We could make Mechagodzilla!!! Tokyo, here I come...
Honestly, this article received quite a bit of attention then too...
At least these muscles won't suffer from Brewers Droop...
Task Mangler
Why put emotion into it? It's pretty simple. People will use it. If you don't you'll get thrown into an airplane. Therefore, better get it implanted. Dead people don't mull over ethics.
Just like all of the robots in the future. I'm sure it's not coincidence.
So, what if things get too hot? Will the muscles stay contracted? Sounds almost too easy to sabotage.
Or did I misunderstand?
Join the anonymous, help develop the network: http://www.i2p2.de
skeletal muscle
Whoa. okay.
Fact 1. You know, the human body is so efficient at converting Calorie input into work output that in the world of fitness and nutrition, we practically don't even need to differentiate between Calorie intake and Calorie output! Eating exactly 500 Calories less is almost the same as performing exactly 500 Calories of work! (I think that fairly exact Calorie output testing can be performed in the laboratory, although I don't know the technique.)
Fact 2. Now let's all take a moment to read the Wipedia article on the human muscle, which includes:Okay, so combined with 100 times that of normal skeletal muscle, these lab muscles can perform work at a rate of 335 kW or 450 horsepower per second at pretty much perfect efficiency! Holy shit.
So how far away are we from organic power plants?
Wait a minute, 459 horsepower? How far are we from starting the morning with a couple of gallons of nutritional shake for our organic car?
We can rebuild him, make him stronger, faster....
Col Steve Austin is the "6 Million dollar Man."
duhduh taduhhh
"If I were bound by all laws everywhere I'm sure I would have committed a capital crime somewhere."
I'm quite sure you've never had sex.
In the larger interests of mankind perhaps the government should fund sex therapy sessions for all potential mad scientists.
Deleted
Mods, can I get a +5, Informative for this?
You BITE his shiny metal ass!
The SF world doesn't begin and end with anime or video games, which are old bad American pre-1930's sci-fi warmed over. And over. And over. And over. And over...
If ya want to imagine coolness, picture Marvel Comic's Iron Man Armor. Now that's a fun toy. Closely related to Heinlein's Marine armor, which Lee probably never heard of. I used to dream of engineering a full suit of powered armor. (Sadly, it'll probably come into initial use intimidating protestors, as usual. We're kind of short on real enemies, so the weaponmeisters turn their gaze on dissenters within. If you don't have real enemies, make some up. If you doubt me, look at what our police wear facing down Quakers and similar madmen. They look like they are expecting rocket fire, with all that armor. Exactly why do they need military armor to face down college kids? Do they really think they're in some kind of danger, or is it just bullying?)
The weapons labs were full of comics and classic SF fans; sadly, now they will probably be anime fans, who never got the pure stuff from the original SF sources. What the old timers could have dreamed up had they known then what we see everyday. They had style and imagination. They were original.
...these devices had a lifting strength more than 100 times that of normal skeletal...
Average heavyweight weightlifter has 100 times more lifting power than average nerd as well...
one of the problems with lifting weight of this kind is whether or not our skeletons can take it. the bones in your limbs can only support so much weight. it doesnt do you any good to have the strength to lift a car over your head if it will break the bones in your arms in the process.
it strikes me that some sort of skeletal reinforcement will be needed before this can be used to its fullest extent.
I ignore Anonymous Coward posts. If you want to discuss something, that's awesome. Log in.
Scientists have developed artificial, super-strength muscles which are powered by alcohol and hydrogen.
This could take bar fights to a whole new level.
I just saw Ghost In The Shell, and now I get to read this?! This is getting creepy... BTW, will alcohol-powered muscles suffer from hangover the next morning? If not, I want my head replaced with one of these, please. And do it quietly, thank you!
Of course, these new toys sound great. But, what they don't tell you is that they'll break five minutes after you get them home :)
Surely this is all we need to make a decent mass market bipedal robot?
Commodore64_love: I don't comprehend people who're so frightened of death that they'll bankrupt themselves to stay alive
I live with Muscular Dystrophy - A muscle degeneration disease that causes muscle to deterierate over time and I think this could possibly be a turning point. Now the cost and further exploration of this type of technology might take awhile but this proves that there might be something out there.
I have for some time wanted to write a story including a "car" powered by a V-8 engine which is organic above the crankshaft. I have done my little engineering studies of nutrient bath and circulatory systems, exhaust issues (I mean this thing shits all over the road) and such... I have so far envisioned genetically tuned muscles, grown in a vat (or what-have-you), but the synthetic muscles are interesting.
The problem is that I don't have a story there, just a neato idea. Not even characters. That doesn't stop many SF writers, unfortunately.
Don't trust anyone under thirty.
Now I can re-create scenes from Mortal Kombat as Jax...
My neighbours better watch the fuck out...
Jan
Shape memory alloys are already available to hobbiest in the form of nitinol wire. One of the problems is the very slow cycle times. The wire I have seen is only capable of about 3 contract/relax cycles per minute under ambient cooling. The main problem seems to be that once the wire is heated up in order for it to contract, it is hard to dissipate the heat out of the wire fast enough, to get the wire back to its original length or shape. Also, compared to just a normal RC servo, the nitinol wire was very energy inefficient.
This is a really cool creation and the scientists responsible will slap (100 times harder than you've ever been slapped) anyone who disagrees!
Optimist: The thumb drive is half empty! Pessimist: The thumb drive is half full...
Why is everyone here thinking "body augmentation"? I think this has very interesting implications for robotics and other forms of mechanical engineering; methinks the muscle is a pretty smart invention for certain types of movement and force application.
My muscles are augmented.
One word: BattleMechs
I'll be back
"We are all geniuses when we dream"
- E.M. Cioran
Now, combine this with a Realdoll, and you have yourself the perfect android. Ltc. Data would be envious. :P
..."We have the technology..."
Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.
Holy crap, was anyone else reminded of MechWarrior? That sounds an awful lot like Myomer.
My dream of piloting a robotic exo-skeleton may be coming closer!
The discovery of myomers (artificial muscles) in the Battletech universe was a little less sanguine:
Atlas: Is everything all set? Unauthorized personnel out?...Everyone behind the safety barriers?...All right. Good luck, everyone. O.K. Devers, charge the myomer bundle.
Devers: Myomer bundle charge at 100 percent.
Atlas: Trethers, measuring instruments ready?
Trethers: Yes, sir.
Atlas: Fine. Iona, turn on the cameras. Countdown from five, four, three, two, one, discharge.
[Professor Atlas pushed the discharge switch. Immediately, all the potential energy stored in the myomer bundle became one swift and powerful contraction as the electric current traveled through it. The new myomer bundle composition of "Schwarzenegger's Bicep" contracted into a mass one-tenth its original size. It ripped the thick metal tubing of the test harness to shreds, causing ten-kilogram lead weights to be tossed into the air like confetti. Some of the scientists had to run for their lives to avoid the falling weights.]
Atlas: My God. Am I hallucinating?
Trethers: Professor, the contraction was off the scale of my instruments!
Atlas: Which means what?
Trethers: A pull of over one metric ton!
Atlas: I think it's time to get rip-snorting drunk, don't you?
...look anything like this?
Bush is a cylon.
Hmm. Science Ficton looks like it might become Science Reality. Cool. Starship Troopers. Battlemechs. Now where the heck is my fusion powered flying car?
What's really significant here is that these will be practical. Forget 100 times strength. Think 2x or 3x at a weight that the human skeleton can manage without requiring reinforcement in earth gravity. Current exoskeleton type enhancement or even prosthetics are limited by the amount of weight and bulk they bring along to the arrangement, we can only handle so much.
This new tech would allow for very light weight and form fitting systems that could allow for normal range of movement and speed of movement while still providing enhamcement at the human scale... instead of requiring huge bulky robotic looking suits.
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
Excellent, now all I need is some cybereyes, a datajack, and some skillsofts and I start start doing runs on the 8+ diamond stores in town.
"I have great faith in fools: Self confidence my friends call it." ~Edgar Allan Poe
Where's my Battle Mech? I want my 100 tons of walking destruction!
Architectural plans are like computer source code with a couple of differences: You only compile once.
Who said this _has_ to be used for artificial limbs? The first thing I thought of was replacing all those hydraulic systems on construction machinery.
Now throw together some bones, ligaments and skin that can handle that kind of stress and I'll be in for a full body replacement.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Any chance this could be applicable for use in artificial hearts?
"The Greens lynched a hacker in Chicago. Last month, but I think the body's still hanging from the old Water Tower."
I'm thinking that until we come up with a good way to reinforce our skeletons, super muscles won't live up to their potential. It's no good having muscles that can pick up an SUV if you snap your bones in the process. The muscles have to anchor to something after all.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Slashdot might as well turn into wired.
I have for some time wanted to write a story including a "car" powered by a V-8 engine which is organic above the crankshaft. ...
Get a horse!
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Scientists have developed artificial, super-strength muscles which are powered by alcohol and hydrogen.
Gives a whole new meaning to beer muscles!
How about reversing these muscle motors, like we do rotary ones, to make generators? Strapping them across hot parts absorbing the wasted energy from inefficient generation tech to capture more efficiency.
;) our power consumption problems. Especially if that tech's product lifecycle itself consumes very little energy compared to how much it conserves.
Really any tech that can very efficiently capture heat and convert it to useable power, whether stored in chemical bonds, transmitted light or electric current will transform (pun intended
--
make install -not war
Well both of those have their place. There could be lightweight suits to assist in working in a warehouse or moving company, lifting boxes and stuff, a larger one for lifting dumpsters (FULLY replacing those noisy pneumatic garbage truck lifters! =) , and then a full sized one for cargo containers like you see on 18 Wheelers.
Then there could be suits for athletics, bringing sports into a whole new dimension.
There could be *silent* airplanes that flap their own wings.
Sheesh. The invention is huge, depending on how efficient those muscles are. But I wouldn't narrow the repercussions down to small suits.
"Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us." -Jesus Christ The Lord's Prayer
The novelty in this article is not the artificial muscle or the strength of the muscle itself, but the idea of powering (heating) an SMA with a chemical reaction instead of electricity. So the Slashdot headline is a bit misleading...
By the way, yay, UBC got a plug in the article!
Here's an article from 2003: http://www.thebatt.com/media/paper657/news/2003/09 /11/Scitech/Flexing.Metal.Muscles-462763.shtml?nor ewrite200603191516&sourcedomain=www.thebatt.com
I'm pretty sure I read about this in mid 90's as well.
The energy efficiency of the human body is about 20%. If these things are a 100 times as strong, then they should be using substantially more energy. (I think this is a strength to mass comparison). That being said, the fuel stores and cooling systems are going to take up a lot of mass on their own. But well, even a final product with a the mass/strength and fuel storage ability of organics qualifies as a major technilogical acheivment. The nanotube version, while not as powerful, might actually have more potential, should have a higher energy efficiency (electrical systems get the best), and a less powerful cooling system would be needed as a result. This also has some extrordinary potential when it comes to making things like robotic arms, since these will let us copy existing natural models, rather than trying to duplicate the same function with a different system.
Now all we need are super-strong synthetic bones to prevent this sort of thing.
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
The most powerful type, "shorted fuel cell muscles" convert chemical energy into heat, causing a special shape-memory metal alloy to contract.
Shape-memory alloys or "muscle wire" have been around for decades, and are not particularly useful for large-scale robotic motion due to their immense power requirements, short stroke, slow actuation speed, and difficulty of control. This article is pretty lite on new information, but the only innovation seems to be delivering heat via chemical reactions directly on the muscle wires, instead of using electricity. However, I doubt this is much of an improvement, since most SMAs require temperatures of 150 degrees Fahrenheit and over before they'll actuate. Not good when you're making a "bionic muscle" for prosthetics as the article suggests.
The problems with using this to replace / enhance human strength already occurs with natural muscles. Our muscles are capable of far more than we actually get out of them, and in certain times of extreme stress or anguish they can be pushed far beyond "normal". The problem is that normally the muscles are restricted to what the less durable sections of the skeleton and ligament system can take. Human muscles on a sturdier frame with heavier-duty ligaments and bone attachments could achieve a lot more than they already do.
The issue is muscle tearing and skeletal damage.
You can read stories about this in the news every once and a while - a child gets hit by and forced under a car, and an average mother lifts the car off of her child. While it's horrible for your bones and all that, it's still possible.
Even though the obvious thing would be to look at the hitters, it'd be great if this one day could help pitchers. I want to see someone throw 105+ mph and be able pitch again the next day. That would pretty much defeat the probabably already boosted synth-muscle hitters (a hitter still needs to react to the ball in time, no matter how strong). That would be a wonderful achievement for synthetic muscles. Of coruse, we'd probably also need synthetic tendons to hold the synthetic muscluature on, but oh well. Maybe one day instead of Tommy John surgery, pitchers could get the Alex Murphy surgery.
0- Eamonman Proud member of DNRC
So, everyone wants mech warriors and augmentation. Big deal...
I'd like to be able to walk normally again.
While my prosthetic is made of groovy materials (carbon-carbon, carbon fibre and titanium), it lacks even the most basic of control. Sure, there is a small amount of feedback as the carbon-carbon 'foot' flexes, but I have no true ankle control.
I have been waiting for realistic 'active' prosthetics for over ten years now, and hopefully this technology will be available in a relatively reasonable time frame.
Me? I'd be happy to be able to manipulate a gas pedal, or walk on sand without slipping backwards.
In the immortal words of Socrates, who said; 'I drank what?'
Hmm if the shape memory only needs heat to contract and cold expand it would be possible to build a steam powered mecha! House the muscle coils in ceramic and direct alternating steam and water to drive them dumping the excess heat via a radiator.
"Do you take off your face and hands before you go to bed?
And if so, are you some kind of robot?
And if so, what kind of powers do you have?
Do you use them for good, or for awesome?
Would you like to join forces?
I just happen to be the greatest criminal mind of our time."
Synthetic muscle that runs better when it's hot...
Damn, looks like the Clans have caputured our Triple-Strength Myomer technlolgy!
What's next, the C3 Computer?
Man is the animal that laughs.
And occasionally whores for Karma.
Head trauma, splattering on the dashboard, and flying into trees. Only by replacing our fragile structure will we have truly safe experiences with these add-ons.
Because those answers are more obviously untrue.
I will be governor of California.
There could be *silent* airplanes that flap their own wings.
That would properly be called an ornithopter.