New Reconnaissance Recruits - better call S.W.A.T.

This was published on Technorati.com
http://technorati.com/technology/article/new-reconnaissance-recruits-better-call-swat/
Published: September 03, 2011 at 6:39 am

The Terminator, one of the most recognizable icons in the world, and a perfect example of what a cyborg is.  The stuff of science fiction? Think again. You just might be seeing one sooner than you think, in the form of a cyborg bug, a "CYBUG".

For decades, research into robotics and miniaturization have impressive, if not miraculous. Robots build the cars we drive, however getting robotic parts down to the size of an insect, and being functional, have hit quite a few obstacles.

Since 2006, the U.S. DARPA, (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency), has invested over $12 Million into research. The fruits of their investment?
CyBug cockroaches at Texas A&M, Horned beetles at University of Michigan and the University of California at Berkeley, and Moths at an MIT led team, along with another project at the Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research.

Instead of trying to miniaturize robotics, and then control it, they decided to use what Mother Nature has already designed. Insects, one of the most populous life forms on earth, their bodies a design that has successfully survived through the eons to the modern day.

The concept is actually quite simple. The hard shell of an insect is an exoskeleton, already a miniature marvel of evolution. Body, legs, wings, everything you would want a robot to have.

Scientific researchers implant a micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) circuit into the insect while still in the pupae stage of life. As the insect matures, grows, molts, the body tissue grows around the implanted circuitry, literally fusing the insect body with the implant, which is able to control leg and flight muscles, and nervous system processes.

This means that you can be THE FLY ON THE WALL. Surveillance, intelligence gathering, recon, all are applications for this technology.

At first, only Governments with deep pockets to fund this research will have access to it, but imagine a future where wives can hire a private detective to spy on their cheating husbands with CyBugs.