Sci-Fi stuff of the creepy crawly version. In the future, when a drill
instructor says "Listen up maggots!", he may be actually addressing
maggots.
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U.S. Military Plans to Make Insect Cyborgs
by Shaun Waterman
WASHINGTON - Facing problems in its efforts to train insects or build
robots that can mimic their flying abilities, the U.S. military now
wants to develop "insect cyborgs" that can go where its soldiers cannot.
The Pentagon is seeking applications from researchers to help them
develop technology that can be implanted into living insects to control
their movement and transmit video or other sensory data back to their
handlers.
In an announcement posted on government Web sites last week, the Defense
Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, says it is seeking
"innovative proposals to develop technology to create insect cyborgs,"
by implanting tiny devices into insect bodies while the animals are in
their pupal stage.
As an insect metamorphoses from a larva to an adult, the solicitation
notice says, its "body goes through a renewal process that can heal
wounds and reposition internal organs around foreign objects, including
tiny (mechanical) structures that might be present."
The goal is to create technology that can achieve "the delivery of an
insect within five meters of a specific target located at hundred meters
away, using electronic remote control, and/or global positioning
system." Once at the target, "the insect must remain stationary either
indefinitely or until otherwise instructed ... (and) must also be able
to transmit data from (Department of Defense) relevant sensors ...
includ(ing) gas sensors, microphones, video, etc."
The move follows challenges the agency says it has encountered in its
efforts to train insects to detect explosives or other chemical
compounds, and to mimic their flight and movement patterns using small
robots.
Several years ago, DARPA launched a $3 million project to train
honeybees to find landmines. According to a report by the American
Forces Press Service, scientists used sugar-soaked sponges treated with
explosives to get the bees to identify the smell as a possible food
source.
But last week's solicitation says the project didn't work out.
"These activities have highlighted key challenges involving behavioral
and chemical control of insects... Instinctive behaviors for feeding and
mating -- and also for responding to temperature changes -- prevented
them from performing reliably," it says.
As far as the development of purely robotic or mechanical unmanned
aerial vehicles -- so-called micro-UAVs -- the solicitation says that
developing energy sources both powerful and light enough "present(s) a
key technical challenge."
Both sets of challenges "might be effectively overcome" by the
development of insect cyborgs, says the solicitation.
The devices DARPA wants to implant are micro-electro-mechanical systems,
or MEMS. MEMS technology uses tiny silicon wafers like those used as the
basis for computer microchips. But instead of merely laying circuits on
them, MEMS technology can actually cut and shape the silicon, turning
the chip into a microscopic mechanical device.
The solicitation envisages the implanted device as a "platform" onto
which "various microsystem payloads can be mounted ... with the goal of
controlling insect locomotion, sens(ing) local environment, and
scaveng(ing) power."
"Possible methods of locomotion control may be sensory manipulation,
direct muscle interface, or neural interface to the insect," says the
document, known as a Broad Agency Announcement. It goes on to say that
sensory manipulation, for instance by projecting ultrasonic vibrations
or ejecting pheromones, is likely to be species-specific, whereas
technology to directly control insect muscles or brains "may be more
general."
DARPA believes that the heat and mechanical power generated by the
insects themselves as they move around "may be harnessed to power the
microsystem payload" eliminating the need for batteries or other power
systems.
The objective is to transform the insects into "predictable devices that
can be used for various micro-UAV missions requiring unobtrusive entry
into areas inaccessible or hostile to humans."
Among potential missions, says the solicitation, would be the collection
of "explosive signatures from within buildings, caves, or other
inaccessible locations."
Although flying insects like dragonflies and moths are "of great
interest," the document says, "Hopping and swimming insects could also
meet final demonstration goals."
Implanting the devices during pupation is key, says the document,
because "the insects are immobile and can be manipulated without
interference from instinctive motion."
As part of their honeybee training project, DARPA glued tiny radio
transmitters to the bees, to help track their movement.
The solicitation says that the healing processes which insects go
through as they change from larvae into adults "are expected to yield
more reliable bio-electromechanical interface... as compared to
adhesively bonded systems to adult insects."
Inserting the devices in pupae could also "enable assembly-line like
fabrication of hybrid insect-MEMS interfaces, providing a considerable
cost advantage," says the solicitation.
DARPA will hold a day-long conference for contractors interested in
submitting proposals on March 24.
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http://www.commondreams.org/headlines06/0314-03.htm
--
John Hachmann aa #1782
"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities"
-Voltaire
Contact - Throw a .net over the .com
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