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Spinach Plants Turned into Bomb Detectors

posted by martyb on Tuesday November 01 2016, @11:48AM   Printer-friendly
from the set-the-timer-to-9-minutes dept.

takyon writes:

The BBC is reporting on MIT's "bionic spinach":

By embedding tiny tubes in the plants' leaves, they can be made to pick up chemicals called nitro-aromatics, which are found in landmines and buried munitions. Real-time information can then be wirelessly relayed to a handheld device.

The MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) work is published in the journal Nature Materials [DOI: 10.1038/nmat4771] [DX].

The scientists implanted nanoparticles and carbon nanotubes (tiny cylinders of carbon) into the leaves of the spinach plant. It takes about 10 minutes for the spinach to take up the water into the leaves. To read the signal, the researchers shine a laser onto the leaf, prompting the embedded nanotubes to emit near-infrared fluorescent light. This can be detected with a small infrared camera connected to a small, cheap Raspberry Pi computer. The signal can also be detected with a smartphone by removing the infrared filter most have.

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  • (Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday November 01 2016, @05:46PM

    by frojack (1554) on Tuesday November 01 2016, @05:46PM (#421329) Journal

    Nah, just send the locals out in the fields to plant the Spinach.

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