BOMB-SNIFFING BUGS WITHIN THREE YEARS

Last week, the US Office of Naval Research awarded researchers at the Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri $750,000 to alter locusts to remotely sense bombs and other explosive devices. These locusts could detect chemical changes in areas with possible dangers, like land mines, with their antenna, and alert users sitting far away in safety. Baranidharan Raman, a biomedical engineer on the project, says the chemical sensing part of locusts is extremely well developed. They can smell a new odor that comes into the environment within a few hundred milliseconds. The advantage of using bugs is that they have a less complicated neurological system, making them easier to engineer and control. The surgery to modify locusts to be able to transmit sensory data is relatively simple. Researchers plan to tattoo specially engineered silk onto locusts’ wings. This tattoo will convert laser light into heat to goad the bug to fly in different directions. A small electrode surgically implanted into the locust’s brain will allow monitors to sense what the insect’s antenna are picking up. Information from the antenna can be wirelessly transmitted to users stationed in safety. The data the bug’s antenna carry can be used to change the color of a light to indicate whether or not there are explosives in the area being explored by the locusts. Engineers hope to test a prototype before a year has passed, and have fully-functional bomb-detecting bugs within two years.
* Well, it certainly sounds simple enough.
* I’m not sure how this is “Naval Research” but that’s the least ridiculous part of this story.
* Imagine someone presenting this on “Shark Tank.”
* “My idea is this – you take locusts, tattoo them with silk, shoot them with lasers to make them fly around, put an electrode in their brain that makes lights turn color …” “GET OFF THE STAGE!”
* If only the military was as picky with its spending as the tycoons on “Shark Tank.”
* Wait, all we have to do is implant an electrode in a locust’s brain? What are we waiting for?
* Hell, I can do that out in my garage.
* Did they really need to say it was a small electrode? I mean we’re implanting it in a locust’s brain – it’d have to be pretty small.
* Actually the problem with the plan is it still has a few bugs in it.