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Cyborg Cockroach Sparks Ethics Debate
sciencehabit writes "A do-it-yourself neuroscience experiment that allows students to create their own 'cyborg' insects is sparking controversy amongst scienitsts and ethicists. RoboRoach #12 is a real cockroach that a company called BackyardBrains ships to school students. The students fit the insect with a tiny backpack, which contains electrodes that feed into its antennae and receive signals by remote control — via the Bluetooth signals emitted by smartphones. A simple swipe of an iPhone can turn the insect left or right. Though some scientists say the small cyborg is a good educational tool, others say it's turning kids into psychopaths."
Fitting the backpack requires poking a hole in the roach's thorax and clipping its antennae to insert electrodes.
I remember when I was 5, I used to make paper balloons and stick as many crickets as I could find in them, and then I would set it on fire just to watch the hoppy action.
Careful with names containing L slashdot.org/~AiphaWolf_HK slashdot.org/~AlphaWoif_HK slashdot.org/~AiphaWoif_HK
"I guess they were still afraid of the wasps."
And fair enough: if you think humans are bad, 'parasitoids' are a class of organisms that would leave you crying for mommy. A class of organisms that a fair few wasp species belong to.
Oh how very subtle they are: the ones that parasitize caterpillars inject a venom that includes a specialized virus (found nowhere else but the wasp's oviduct, it's more part of the wasps' DNA than a free-living organism) that suppresses the caterpillar's immune response and increase the protein concentration in the hemolymph, perfect for the larvae.
Or the fascinating ones that prey on cockroaches. Those are too heavy to transport after paralysis, so they have specialized sensory capabilities on the tip of their stinger, ideally suited to locating the part of the cockroach brain to disable in order to halt voluntary movement, while leaving the victim otherwise functional and ready to be steered by its antennae back to the burrow where it will be devoured alive by wasp larvae.
And, finally, the ones that prey on spiders, the hunted become the hunter, using their impressive reflexes and even more impressive venom to paralyze spiders (nonlethally, to preserve freshness) so that their larvae can devour them, leaving the vital organs for last (again, to preserve freshness, the victim must live as long as possible while being eaten alive) and then emerge to hunt spiders for their own young.
Parasitoid wasps are badass motherfuckers. Not quite as badass as Cordyceps fungi (not that I'm biased); but pretty fucking badass.