Snail Produces Electricity from Natural Sugar in its Body

[2012 Countdown]

Energy

Electrified snail produce electricity from natural sugar in its body

Published 14 June 2012

The world’s first “electrified snail” has joined the menagerie of cockroaches, rats, rabbits, and other animals previously implanted with biofuel cells that generate electricity — perhaps for future spy cameras, eavesdropping microphones, and other electronics — from natural sugar in their bodies
The world’s first “electrified snail” has joined the menagerie of cockroaches, rats, rabbits, and other animals previously implanted with biofuel cells that generate electricity — perhaps for future spy cameras, eavesdropping microphones, and other electronics — from natural sugar in their bodies. Scientists are describing how their new biofuel cell worked for months in a free-living snail in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.
An American Chemical Society release reports that in the study, Evgeny Katz and colleagues point out that many previous studies have involved “potentially implantable” biofuel cells. So far, however, none has produced an implanted biofuel cell in a small live animal that could generate electricity for an extended period of time without harming the animal. “The snail with the implanted biofuel cell will be able to operate in a natural environment, producing sustainable electrical micropower for activating various bioelectronic devices,” the authors say.
To turn a living snail into a power source, the researchers made two small holes in its shell and inserted high-tech electrodes made from compressed carbon nanotubes. They coated the highly conductive material with enzymes, which foster chemical reactions in animals’ bodies. Using a different enzyme on each electrode, one pulling electrons from glucose and another using those electrons to turn oxygen molecules into water, they induced an electric current. Importantly, the long-lasting enzymes could generate electricity again and again after the scientists fed and rested what they termed the “electrified” snail, which lived freely for several months with the implanted fuel cell.
-
http://www.homelandsecuritynewswire.com ... n-its-body

[Burnt Hill]

It looks like they are jump starting a car with that snail.

[Simulist]

Snail Produces Electricity from Natural Sugar in its Body

Snails producing natural salt in their bodies were unavailable for comment.

[82_28]

http://boingboing.net/2012/06/13/salt-m ... d-slu.html

Producing electricity could be akin something remotely cosmically genius, I think. They just aren't set up for salt. Much like humans aren't set up for LRAD's and drones.

[Simulist]

http://boingboing.net/2012/06/13/salt-m ... d-slu.html

That's hilarious.

Thanks.

[Nordic]

I've been thinking lately that soon our cell phones will be implanted, somehow, into our bodies, and that our bodies will, somehow, be charging them.

Looks like somebody else has that sort of thing in mind also.

[Schmazo]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOMiowrff0Y

[barracuda]

This is just an early way station on the transmolluscan journey towards the post-Gastropoda singularity.

[Burnt Hill]

http://www.rdmag.com/News/2012/06/Materials-Researchers-Use-Nanotechnology-To-Harness-The-Power-Of-Fireflies/?et_cid=2699176&et_rid=368862106&linkid=http%3a%2f%2fwww.rdmag.com%2fNews%2f2012%2f06%2fMaterials-Researchers-Use-Nanotechnology-To-Harness-The-Power-Of-Fireflies%2f
Researchers use nanotechnology to harness the power of fireflies

"Firefly light is one of nature's best examples of bioluminescence," Maye says. "The light is extremely bright and efficient. We've found a new way to harness biology for non-biological applications by manipulating the interface between the biological and non-biological components."

[Simulist]

This is just an early way station on the transmolluscan journey towards the post-Gastropoda singularity.

OMG. Earlier today, I saw that pic on my iOS device — and it rendered it as the motionless picture of a snail.

Perspective is everything.

[smoking since 1879]

[Simulist]

"They say that the soul is the food of the Archons and Powers without which they cannot live, because she is of the dew from above, and gives them strength."

— Epiphanius of Salamis, Panarion, 40,2; ca. 375, C.E.

[Burnt Hill]

I've been thinking lately that soon our cell phones will be implanted, somehow, into our bodies, and that our bodies will, somehow, be charging them.

Looks like somebody else has that sort of thing in mind also.

http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2012/06/fuel-cell-runs-on-brain-power.html?rss=1

Fuel Cell Runs on Brain Power
by Steven Ross
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have designed an implantable glucose fuel cell that can generate electricity from the cerebrospinal fluid around the brain. The results of these efforts, published this week in PLoS ONE, show that a few hundred microwatts of power could be harvested from glucose within the cerebrospinal fluid with no adverse physiological effects.

[2012 Countdown]

Cuda -funny tag line.

When the Norway spiral thread came up recently i reviewed those pages, remembering all those graphics and overlays I'd made for it. That was a fun thread. I saw the snail gif in it and chuckled, but this deployment with the text is funnier.

And yes, enjoyed that gauntlet too 82-28.

[barracuda]

I guess it does come off as a bit of a throwaway, but the more I thought bout it the more I felt the idea may have some serious aspects. That is, if the singularity is more than a poetical device and the cybernetic is an integral part of that process, won't creatures such as these be first on the assembly line?

The insect spy drones are already completely robotic and in production:





And DARPA's researches into implanting micro-electro-mechanical systems into insects are already fairly advanced even to general public knowledge.

Anyway, I'd expect to see any number of species suffering under the effects of the elitist transformation to partial biological organism as an indicator of the viral nature of this type of technological philosophy. Their "simpler" physical characteristics may be easier to harvest and manipulate, and the experiments that we can expect to see on humans may crop up in "lower" organisms first.

Of course "simpler" and "lower" are really effectively class-biased judgements, so a translation of these biases to our own class system is also to be expected, and that is in fact exactly what we're seeing: many of the cybernetic advances being currently exploited in human subjects are found in soldiers, the most expendable slaves available to the elite.