Sappers, take off!

The cyborg locust will search for explosives

Dronk.ru , Geektimes, based on Washington University in St. Louis: Engineers to use cyborg insects as biorobotic sensing machines

"Release the locust-sapper" – such a command in two years may be able to be given by the heads of the sapper units thanks to research conducted today by a group of American scientists and engineers from Washington University in St. Louis. In order to turn locusts into a controlled bio-cyborg, the US Navy, which is interested in an early result, has already allocated a three-year grant in the amount of $ 750,000 to the head of the group, Baranidharan Raman (Baranidharan Raman).

Baranidharan Raman, associate professor of Biomedical Engineering at the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, was able to provide the leadership of the US Office of Naval Research (ONR) with sufficiently strong arguments in favor of the prospects of development and receive a three-year grant of $ 750,000 required for research. This amount allowed not only to ensure the interest of key specialists in various fields of knowledge, but also to create all conditions for conducting fruitful experiments.

Comprehensive research conducted by the Raman Laboratory over the past few years has allowed us to study in detail how the relatively simple brain of locusts receives and processes sensory signals. The researchers concluded that even minor changes in the chemical composition of the air, which cause the appearance of odor, provoke almost instantaneous dynamic neural activity of the insect brain. As experiments have shown, using this simplest mechanism, locusts are able to accurately identify a specific smell even in the composition of many others.

A number of experiments aimed at studying the ability of locusts to acquire the skills of selective response to specific odors have brought a positive result. Moreover, locusts that have been "trained" were able to accurately identify the desired smell not only as part of the set of others, but also when exposed to background conditions that aggravate perception.

"Why reinvent the wheel? Why not use ready-made structural biological solutions? – says Raman – No, ... even the most advanced miniature chemical devices today use only a few sensors. On the other hand, it is worth looking at the antennae of insects, and you will consider several hundred thousand sensors, and of various types. Isn't it easier and more effective to use these natural capabilities to detect explosives?" The results of the experiments collected by Raman over several years of studying insects also look quite convincing. They also confirm that their olfactory organs work orders of magnitude more accurately and efficiently than the most modern sensory technologies.

In accordance with the task, Raman and a team of fellow programmers, materials scientists and circuit engineers proposed using the natural capabilities of the locust sensory olfactory system as the basis for the development of a "bio-hybrid nose". Researchers are going to achieve the goal in several stages.

Task N1. "Biological sensing systems are an order of magnitude more complex than their cybernetic counterparts. This fully applies to the chemical sensing system responsible for the sense of smell," Raman explained. In order to turn a harmful insect into a creature capable of saving people's lives, of course, surgical intervention will be required. For this purpose, it is planned to implant special sensors in the brain of locusts that will decode neural impulses. According to Raman, a few hours after such an operation, the insect is already in perfect order.

The task of N2 is to develop a miniature backpack–transmitter with LEDs, mounted on the back of a locust and transmitting signals from the insect's brain to the receiver. The situation when the smell is not recognized will correspond to a burning green LED, and when the smell is identified, it will be accompanied by a red light.

The task of N3 is to turn locusts into an aircraft controlled from the ground and develop a system that allows the insect to be directed to the place of potential explosives. The researchers intend to solve this problem with the help of a specific "tattoo" on the wings, applied with biocompatible silk. A low-energy laser beam directed by the operator, falling on the tattoo, turns into heat. When focusing the beam on the tattoo located on the left wing, the insect is reoriented to the left, and vice versa.

Another irreplaceable advantage of the technology proposed by a group of American researchers is the incredible speed of odor recognition: in order to identify any of them, a locust will only need a fraction of a second.

In addition, tattoos literally strewn with plasmonic nanostructures will allow collecting samples of volatile organic compounds in the contact zone to study their chemical composition using more traditional methods.

According to the information published on the university's website, the prototype of the cyborg locust will be presented by the Raman group in a year. Taking into account the recent work of the professor and the rating of his laboratory in scientific circles, this promise no longer seems so unlikely. If the researchers' plans come true, then in two years the squadrons of flying bio-cyborgs will go on their first reconnaissance mission.

About the laboratory of Raman Baranidharan
The research conducted in Raman's laboratory is aimed at understanding the organization and principles of functioning of biological sensory systems used by the relatively simple olfactory system of invertebrates. To achieve this goal, by combining various electrophysiological recording methods and computational modeling methods, scientists are investigating how multidimensional and dynamic odor signals are encoded in the neural representation (odor coding) and processed in the brain.
Understanding how the brain interprets complex sensory stimuli is essential for the development of neuromorphic devices and algorithms for solving parallel engineering problems. In collaboration with the National Institute of Standards and Technology, Professor Raman's laboratory is currently developing a neuromorphic "electronic nose" based on MEMS micro-sensor arrays for non-invasive chemical sensing. Potential target applications for electronic nose technology include medical diagnostics, national security, environmental monitoring, space exploration, robotics, and human-computer interaction.

Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru  11.07.2016