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Israeli Company Trains Security Mice

Israeli scientists have created an explosive detector using specially trained mice. Researchers claim the mice are more accurate than dogs or x-ray machines and best of all, they work for peanuts. From the article: "The device was tested last year on 1,000 shoppers in a Tel Aviv shopping mall when the mice successfully picked out 22 people carrying mock explosives."

7 of 96 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Volunteers? by An+ominous+Cow+art · · Score: 5, Funny

    Will these mice be members of Moussad?

  2. Not bad by Klync · · Score: 3

    Explosion detection is pretty cool, and useful I'm sure. But I was hoping for special ops commandos.

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    Not to be confused with Col.
  3. This will only encourage by Chrisq · · Score: 3, Informative

    This will only encourage those who blame Mossad for shark attacks and who detained a vulture for working for Mossad. perhaps they will be detaining mice now.

  4. Re:Did not read by hedwards · · Score: 3, Informative

    This is similar to work that's been done with rodents being used to detect landmines. The animals themselves are light enough that they can stand on the mines without detonating them, and use their sense of smell to locate and alert the handler as to the location of the ordinance. Move over sniffer dogs, here come Africa’s rats

  5. Good method! by Chemisor · · Score: 3, Funny

    With a live mouse down your pants, you'll confess to anything!

  6. Lifespan by Riceballsan · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The mice may work for penuts, but training them can't be free, and then assuming the mice can be trained in 3-4 months then you still have to deal with an average lifespan of only 2 years.

  7. False Positives. by Faux_Pseudo · · Score: 3, Interesting

    They found all 22 out of 1000 but the article doesn't tell us how many they declined to tell us how many false positives they got. Which, in my book, makes this story useless for science but serve a use as a PR use. "Those crazy zionists have mice that can detect bombs!"
    Also the story doesn't mention anything about the process or methods. Are the mice running free? Trapped in a box? Is the mouse live or dead? Is it live or dead in a box? Does it use smell or does it turn colors?

    Sure some of that is joking but this article really doesn't say much and leaves a lot to speculation.