Scientists Use Stems Cells From Frogs To Build First Living Robots (theguardian.com) 37
Cy Guy writes: Having not learned the lessons of Jurassic Park and the Terminator, scientists from the University of Vermont and Tufts have created "reconfigurable organisms" using stem cells from frogs. But don't worry, the research was funded by the Department of Defense, so I'm sure nothing could possibly go wrong this time. "The robots, which are less than 1mm long, are designed by an 'evolutionary algorithm' that runs on a supercomputer," reports The Guardian. "The program starts by generating random 3D configurations of 500 to 1,000 skin and heart cells. Each design is then tested in a virtual environment, to see, for example, how far it moves when the heart cells are set beating. The best performers are used to spawn more designs, which themselves are then put through their paces."
"Because heart cells spontaneously contract and relax, they behave like miniature engines that drive the robots along until their energy reserves run out," the report adds. "The cells have enough fuel inside them for the robots to survive for a week to 10 days before keeling over."
The findings have been published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"Because heart cells spontaneously contract and relax, they behave like miniature engines that drive the robots along until their energy reserves run out," the report adds. "The cells have enough fuel inside them for the robots to survive for a week to 10 days before keeling over."
The findings have been published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Re: (Score:2)
There are those that claim because a blob of cells has electrical activity similar to living person means the blob is also a person. Why not in this case? You have a beating "heart" so quite obviously it should have rights.
ATOMIC RiBBOTS! (Score:2)
You're not supposed to be using literal frog eggs ! [google.com]
You call yourselves mad scientists?!!!
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If this goes anywhere I predict 24 hours after the general public hears about it.
Do they have souls?
And the name of the scientist was... (Score:2)
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I'ts Frankensteen!
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Be careful (Score:5, Funny)
I hear these robots sometimes can get hopping mad.
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Opportunty missed (Score:2)
TFS:
> "The cells have enough fuel inside them for the robots to survive for a week to 10 days before keeling over."
Surely should have been:
> "The cells have enough fuel inside them for the robots to survive for a week to 10 days before croaking it."
and as someone said this morning:
"ribbit-stance is futile"
Re: Be careful (Score:2)
They use beer as their primary cooling system. Specifically IPAs, because of all the hops, naturally.
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better then Raptors
funny.. (Score:2)
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Going to go out on a limb and suggest that most objection to stem cell usage is related to the origin of the material, and not "zomg, stem cells." i.e. "using cells knowing donated by an adult human? OK. Using cells harvested from (adult or embryonic) animals? OK. Using cells harvested from aborted humans? Not OK."
On the other hand, I'm pretty sure you knew that already and are just trolling.
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Using cells harvested from aborted humans? Not OK. ...
Why would it not be ok? Those are the best ones
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They took frog spawn to produce this. Enough experiments have been done on the human variant of that.
Ten Days? (Score:1)
If you kiss one of the robots (Score:3)
Not really living, then. (Score:1)
They can't sustain lifr at all. Just wind-up toys that can only function for a short time spell.
Come back to show us when they can self-refuel.
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They put the robots in aqueous environment - water. No fuel in that medium. But, they were living cells so, they could have "refueled" if the fuel was available.
Instead, they could have used cell culture media, in which case they would have refueled continuously. But, if so, the "robots" would have grown, obliterating their architecture quickly, like a metal or plastic toy robot morphing into Silly Putty.
Re: Not really living, then. (Score:2)
A light that burns twice as bright burns half as long.
â" Eldon Tyrell
An energy source for surveillance (Score:1)
Typo in headline (Score:1)
Zerg (Score:2)
Isnt this pretty much how the Zerg were created? I realize it was a fictional game but losing control is not exclusive to fiction.
I have seen similar tech used in pickles (Score:1)
MAXIM 14 (Score:2)
MAXIM 14: "Mad science" means never stopping to ask "what's the worst thing that could happen?"
ITEOTWAWKI (Score:1)
But I feel fine.
Not really all that scary. (Score:1)
Don't you really mean (Score:2)
Scientists used stem cells to create the world's first living ribits
A leap in technology! (Score:1)
R.U.R. (Score:2)
Robots? (Score:1)