New Robot Uses Living Brain
Scientists in Chicago have created the first cyborg that is controlled by a living brain. It works like a robot and thinks like an eel.
It has been created by combining the extracted brain of a tiny, eel-like lamprey with a high-technology robot the size of a cigarette pack. The brain is kept alive in an oxygenated saline solution. When it detects a light, the electronic eyes on the device send a signal to the brain, which commands thewheels to roll via a microprocessor.
“Until the recent past, people were using biological nervous systems to inspire technology,” says Sandro Mussa-Ivaldi of Northwestern University. “Now we have gone one step beyond, to tap into the nervous system itself.”
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