Robot Stingray Is Powered By Rat Heart Cells (ieee.org)

An anonymous reader writes: Harvard researchers report in the journal Science this week that they've built a "bio-inspired swimming robot that mimics a ray fish [and] can be guided by light." The robot's body consists of "a cast elastomer body with a skeleton of gold, along with a single layer of carefully aligned muscle fibers harvested from neonatal rat hearts." The fibers were genetically modified to respond to pulses of blue light and structured along the body of the robot such that contractions result in a repetitive undulating motion, propelling the robot forward. "About 200,000 live rat heart cells form the muscle layer that powers the robot, which has a body 16.3 mm long and weighs just over 10 grams," reports IEEE. "At full tilt, it can swim at a speed of 3.2 mm/s, which isn't bad for such a tiny thing." You can watch the video that shows the robot being led through a 250 mm long obstacle course.

Comments

hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Synthetic ray overlords

Re:hmmm

[Big Hairy Ian]

I'm just waiting for the robot Steve Urwin

*sigh*

[Anonymous Coward]

This has been on the front page for 50 minutes. Two comments. Where is the slashdot I used to know?

Re:*sigh*

[negRo_slim]

We're dividing out time amongst Hacker News, Reddit, Soylent, 4chan, Fark and Ars Technica. All while ensuring we post to Twitter and Facebook only the choicest nuggets of web to make ourselves look in-the-know and super smart. Where are you?

Robot Stingray

[fustakrakich]

Is this another FBI thing? Do cell phone even work under water?

Since nobody mentioned it yet:

[Anonymous Coward]

Won't someone think of the poor aborted rat fetuses!

Where do you think they are getting prenatal rat muscle cells from?

And for that matter, how long do those cells maintain viability without circulatory and respitory systems, and a supply of food?

While I admire the advances of science, I do wonder if all those 'alien abductions' are real, and if so, if we have any moral standing to claim they are bad while doing the same to less advanced life forms ourselves.

Re:Since nobody mentioned it yet:

[Opportunist]

Considering the creatures that usually claim they got abducted, I can only see this as a good thing.

The bad thing is that the aliens find out just WHAT they got and send them back.

Re:Since nobody mentioned it yet:

[Anonymous Coward]

Not really basing this on anything and haven't read the TFA, but perhaps the liquid it's in isn't pure water, but oxygenated nutrient enriched water?

Re:Since nobody mentioned it yet:

[Anonymous Coward]

It's definitely not water and it was indeed in the articles supplementary materials:
http://science.sciencemag.org/content/sci/suppl/2016/07/07/353.6295.158.DC1/Park-SM.pdf

Locomotion performance testing of the tissue-engineered ray
To test the locomotion performance of the tissue-engineered rays, they were placed in Tyrode’s solution in 22 cm by 22 cm water chamber of which temperature was maintained at 35 C to 37 C by a hotplate (VWR International, Radnor, PA).

Tyrode’s solution is a buffered mix of various salts and a sugar that provide a close osmotic gradient to the fluids that would normally surround the cells. Obviously the cells need an energy source but beyond that simply putting the cells into water would be akin to putting a salt water fish into fresh water :)

Stingray = Shark, Light = laser

[retroworks]

[Oblig] How long before the fricking lasers get attached to the heads of the fricking sharks?

Re:Typical Micro$oft!

[Anonymous Coward]

Always trying to mess with customers. Hoooray linux and unix!!!!

It's the Democrats they are powered by Rat Hearts it's their way.

Frankenstein's monsters?

[gatzke]

I, for one, welcome our new zombie rat-stingray overlords.

Seriously, add some fiber optics, LEDs, and a Raspberry Pi and we have some awesome robots. Think BigDog / PetMan but organically actuated. Encapsulate the fibers in the special fluid that keeps them alive and we have a cool metal-free actuator (that currently only lives a week). Still very cool.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Mashine or life-form?

[Bristol_92]

It’s a stunning creation. Hope that in nearest future this bio-engineering technology will be used for creation new organism and for peaceful purposes only. And I want to traverse one subject. This robot built of living animals cells. It forces a question: Is it alive?

Re:Mashine or life-form?

[Anonymous Coward]

The cells are indeed alive. It is not however sentient if that's what you were concerned with. And you need not worry about the nefarious implications for the technology, they've essentially just created a fish tail. Maybe if they can scale the technology up you'll be able to become some kind of trans-human-cyborg/merman ;)

Re:Mashine or life-form?

[Anonymous Coward]

"mashine"? In the movie Idiocracy, they were looking for a "Time Masheen". Guess we're getting closer to that movie's reality ...

Re:Mashine or life-form?

[Anonymous Coward]

There's a video on Youtube detailing why Idiocracy was a utopia compared to where we're going. The president could drive down streets on his hog, ours has an armored motorcade. They threw keggers on the White House lawn, ours will soon have a specially designed 14' fences and already has SAM sites, tactical teams and snipers. Their government sought out the smartest individual they could find to help solve societies problems, ours seeks out teams of industry lobbyists and bureaucrats.

Re:Mashine or life-form?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ahh, so we're heading towards a paranocracy.

Re:Mashine or life-form?

[Anonymous Coward]

This robot built of living animals cells. It forces a question: Is it alive?

Partially. I think the correct term is "cyborg".

Echoes of BSG

[mridoni]

Can you say Cylon Raider?

Re:Terror attacks

[Megol]

We aren't supposed to as the motivation is still unknown.

Skeleton of gold?

[Jogar the Barbarian]

Was it infinitely improbable that it would also have a heart of gold?

Next up

[ThatsNotPudding]

The Joy Can!!*







* - Orphan's heart not included

Venture Brothers

[Ugmo]

This reminds me of the invention that Rusty makes that is powered by the heart and soul of an orphan boy. It is a little creepy.

I welcome our new cyborg overloards

[Anonymous Coward]

So can the people worrying about robots stop that and concentrate on the real threat, cyborgs.

Re:I welcome our new cyborg overloards

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds kind of like the beginnings of the Bubblegum Crisis series (or at least one of them). If I'm remembering correctly in the series humans have developed some pretty advanced robotics/cybernetics but actually controlling that technology is elusive. So a scientists stumbles across the idea of implanting a chip in his young daughters brain that mimics her synapses and eventually learns all of the mobility and cognitive skills to create what become to be known as "boomers" They are Robotic/cybernetic systems used as general laborers and they usher a new age of prosperity. However unfortunately (at least for that purpose) the chip also mimicked some of the girls consciousness and despite all efforts to erase/remove it the human consciousness sometimes breaks through and upon realizing it is trapped in mechanical shell goes insane, killing and destroying everything in its path.

Sales talk can make anything sound good.

[OpenSourced]

-We use only the finest baby rats, dew picked and flown from Iraq, cleansed in finest quality spring water, lightly killed, and then sealed in a succulent Swiss quintuple smooth treble cream milk chocolate envelope and lovingly frosted with glucose.

-That's as maybe, it's still a rat.

- What else?

Fucking necromancy

[Anonymous Coward]

I think I've said enough. If it's not necromancy, it's frankenstein.

CAPTCHA: "terrible"

This is it, folks

[Anonymous Coward]

This is the biotech equivalent of the Bell Labs transistor in 1947.
You can forget the Space Age delusions, and the Information Age is pretty much at its peak. The next thing will be control over life itself, and the processes that matter engages in. And hopefully, age reversal.
Of course, that'll happen around when I'm 95.

Robot Stingray Is Powered By Rat Heart Cells

[PopeRatzo]

I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm going to pretend I didn't just read that headline and go on with my day as if nothing happened.

The granddaddy of the first Cylon....

[Anonymous Coward]

It kind of reminds me of the Cylon raider that had a biological brain.

Re:Typical Micro$oft!

[Anonymous Coward]

While the Republicans, as everyone knows, have absolutely no heart at all.

I love seeing this on videos posted to large sites

[tickticker]

"This video is unlisted. Be considerate and think twice before sharing."

Way to go, Slashdot!

Crunchy Rat

[OutOnARock]

did you at least take the bones out?

if we took the bones out it wouldn't be crunchy