Posted 05.12.2010 at 4:53 pm
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Carbon Nanotubes
By stretching a carbon nanotube between two electrodes and adding some biotech wizardry, researchers have created a transistor that turns the body's chemical energy into electricity.
St Stev via Flickr
Researchers at the Lawrence Livermore National Lab have taken a big step toward bridging the gap between mind and machine. Using ATP – adenosine triphosphate, the molecular medium of energy exchange present in nearly all living cells – the team has created a novel transistor that could allow electronic devices that can be hooked directly into the nervous system.
The transistor, which creator Aleksandr Noy calls the first integrated bioelectronic system, consists of a carbon nanotube stretched between two electrodes that is wrapped in an insulator at both ends but exposed in the middle. The transistor is then wrapped in a lipid bi-layer akin to those that surround the cells that make up our bodies. When the team applied voltage to the electrodes and poured a solution full of ATP and potassium and sodium ions over the transistor, current flowed from electrode to electrode.
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Technology, Clay Dillow, adenosine triphosphate, ATP, bioelectric interface, electronics, ion exchange, TRANSISTORSThis means the higher the ATP concentration, the stronger the current flows through the transistor. When the ATP concentration is reduced, ions move back through the membrane and the current is reduced. It all adds up to a way to use biological chemical energy to create electricity from the movement of ions in the body.
As for applications, the researchers think they’ve just scratched the surface when it comes to creating integrated bioelectric systems in which machines and living beings communicate in a more seamless way. It could lead to electronics that live permanently within the body without needing batteries or outside power supplies to operate. More importantly, it could lead to the Holy Grail of prosthetic research: mechanical devices that can be wired seamlessly to our brains.
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When it gets to human testing...put my name on the list plz.
If you haven't watched the Anime series Ghost in the Shell, you're missing a prelude into what this sort of technology could do.
Finally! I've been saying for years that to make bioelectronics a feasible industry, they need to be able to run on ATP (running on the same power as the body means as long as the person's alive, so is the electronic device; no recharging required). And they've finally figured out how to do it!
As a biomedical engineering major, you can't possibly understand how excited I am for this tech.
Unfortunately, there's a drawback to reading PopSci. The things presented here are cutting-edge, so new that they've just been invented in the labs. That means it'll still be another 15 to 20 years minimum before anything exciting listed in PopSci actually becomes consumer-grade.
Oh, well. I have something to look forward to when I'm 40 :P
-IMP ;) :)
Wow, this, coupled with some of the amazing new prosthetics they've been building lately could finally mean fully functional replacements for amputees or even the sensory impaired. Not only that, the new ones could eventually become even more powerful (both in terms of strength and functionality) than our original limbs.
*anticipates*
AMAZING, now the neural interface can finally exist, where your thoughts can be sent to a computer, this would just revolutionize the military. Like RougeSquirrel said, sign me up!!!
You will be assimilated. Your biological and technological distinctiveness will be added to our own. Resistance is futile.
Can I grow a pair of large wings and attach them to my arms and fly? I would love to have the arms of a bear.
Someone needs to do something about the new spam comments.
How does that spam bot's messages get through when my legit comments that contain pertinent links not get through the filter?
That being said, I'm still dieing in anticipation for this tech to explode and all the possibilities to get explored.
Wow ....this also has great potential to create a syncronized biological attack that will wipe out the human race. Should we kiss our a$$ good-bye yet?
Prosthetics would be cool, but I’m seeing this as a permanent/mobile power supply for the future of computing. Imagine not having to carry around a portable laptop or be tethered to a powerful desktop. Instead, just press an embedded sensor on the back of your hand to turn on your neural-linked hardware and literally work on the go. We keep seeing all of these great articles about memristors and quantum computers so it’s only a matter of time before we have plausibly small hardware that can be comfortably, safely and conveniently implanted or attached. Now we need to get rid of physical computer monitors and jack into our own visual pathways to either interpose or superimpose what we need to see while still being aware of our surroundings on some level. Or maybe not. We already turn into slack-jawed zombies watching TV or our computer screens so the visual link could even offer different viewing modes ranging from transparent overlaid graphics all the way to opaque 360 degree virtual reality.
@ HazMatt
Good point. Or we could just wait for the Borg to do all this for us.
I can see this, in some ways, having an effect on the obesity epidemic.
We take in too many calories, so mabey something with this material is implanted in the small intestine, and it siphens off the extra to turn into energy for a bio-battery.
People have less heart attacks and can use electronic devices anywhere. a win-win.
If you haven't watched the Anime series Ghost in the Shell, you're missing a prelude into what this sort of technology could do.
i think that if this did move in a ghost in the shellish way that i would both love and willingly sacrifice my body to this tech. also it reminds me a little of serial experiments lain accessing the wired without a device(at least not as they are now defined.XD
but on the other end this would have great implications in medical technologys and if there was a way for this to be used in conjuncture with www.popsci.com/science/article/2010-05/micromasonry-turns-cells-lego-blocks-building-artificial-organs
then i feal that it would be possible to create true biological replacements for body parts.
in closing i would like to say i would love to be one of the first to go in for a full body replacement if it did go in a ghost in the shell way XP
"The clock is running. Make the most of today. Time waits for no man. Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That's why it is called the present." Alice Morse Earle
This type of tech is amazing! Makes me wonder what humans will be like in the coming decades.
digitaldillmaav I'm right there with you! : )
And what if someone hacks your body and makes you do criminal acts like in ghost in shell.
Even bigger, it may open the door for androids being powered by regular food.
"And what if someone hacks your body and makes you do criminal acts like in ghost in shell. "
Then that would be unfortunate. But you have to note that there are things they got wrong in that show. Firewalls and protection are there, but they can be surpassed. A little to easily if you ask me. So I think the protections we'll have in the future will be more advanced than anything they had in that show. But even if the possibility of being hacked remains in some way, I would consider it a risk well worth the cost.
Really its an easy decision for me. On the one hand you could have a cybernetic body that would be practically ageless, and could have other capabilities beyond that of a normal body. The other choice is remain with the body I have now, which is more fragile, and ages. Like I said the choice is easy, for me at least.
"Even bigger, it may open the door for androids being powered by regular food." Also a plus. :)
Our bio-electric, "body-powered" legacy to future generations: Whether or not they should take the blue pill, or the red pill.
Have you seen hackers now they can hack a new devises or software in week or two like the ipad which was hacked in 24 hours of release or close to that in the future do you want give all you money away join a gang or blow up a plane and this should only be used in medical problems.
its a great step forward. The possibilities are endless. Applications for prostetics being the most promising. Hazardous conditions work can be changed forever, with mind controlled drones. How much faster can a programer work, with a direct brain interface, with wireless capapbility. On the flip side of things Of course its hard enough to get people off there cell phones, and work, or even drive competently. Better yet, put the damn thing away and have a normal conversation. With out the damn things being able to be implanted in there heads.