From UPI, 3/12/06:
http://www.upi.com/inc/view.php?StoryID=20060312-073227-3194r

U.S. military plans to make insect cyborgs

By SHAUN WATERMAN
UPI Homeland and National Security Editor

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.

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Hmmmmmmmmmmmm

Harry