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DragonflEye consists of a living, slightly modified dragonfly that carries a small backpack of electronics. The backpack interfaces directly with the dragonfly's nervous system to control it, and uses tiny solar panels to harvest enough energy to power itself without the need for batteries. Draper showed us a nifty looking mock-up of what the system might look like a few months ago, but today, they've posted the first video of DragonflEye taking to the air.
The unique thing about DragonflEye (relative to other cyborg insects) is that it doesn't rely on spoofing the insect's sensors or controlling its muscles, but instead uses optical electrodes to inject steering commands directly into the insect's nervous system, which has been genetically tweaked to accept them. This means that the dragonfly can be controlled to fly where you want, without sacrificing the built-in flight skills that make insects the envy of all other robotic micro air vehicles.
[Video]: https://vimeo.com/219709402
[Additional Info and Interview]: For lots more on DragonflEye
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 01 2017, @09:57PM (13 children)
On one: very cool, cyborg insects, bend mother nature to our will!
On the other: fucked up shit to do to a living creature. "I'm just gonna hijack our nervous system a little bit, make you wear a bulky invasive backpack, and glue some solar panels to your wings."
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bob_super on Thursday June 01 2017, @10:05PM (2 children)
Coming from the same civilization where so many people keep trying to hijack your optic nerve in order to direct you to a store ... but you typically pay for the privilege.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Friday June 02 2017, @01:39AM (1 child)
Yeah, but you can Look Away Bob. Advertising doesn't frog-march you into the store.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by coolgopher on Friday June 02 2017, @03:02AM
Yet.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by julian on Thursday June 01 2017, @10:35PM (9 children)
Insects certainly suffer less than mammalian and avian livestock, yet we have no trouble justifying the raising and slaughtering of animals for their meat, milk, and eggs. On any taxonomy of suffering informed by our current best understanding of neurology insects would have to be below most other animals that we torture by the millions every day.
I'm not against meat eating myself, but I do go out of my way to 1) reduce it as much as possible, and 2) when I do eat meat to find animals that were raised well and suffered as little as possible--which means no factory farming.
Hell, a dragonfly isn't even a vertebrate. Fish have richer emotional lives than they do. There just isn't the hardware available for supporting much consciousness, let alone sentience worth of the name.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Friday June 02 2017, @01:46AM (1 child)
And you know this HOW?
Cattle have life pretty good actually. Most farmers and ranchers actually do care about their animals. Right up to the point they die quickly.
I've always lived around small dairy farms and even as a kid back in the late 50s I remember these guys taking pretty good care if their herd.
Corporate farms maybe not so much.
Large chicken ranches have been pretty inhumane. But we don't actually know how much the birds actually suffer of even if that concept applies to them.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 4, Informative) by julian on Friday June 02 2017, @03:30AM
I'm a biologist.
Please visit a factory farm.
These are the vast majority of farms.
(Score: 1, Troll) by Runaway1956 on Friday June 02 2017, @02:47AM (6 children)
"Insects certainly suffer less than mammalian and avian livestock,"
I'm with Frojack on that. HOW do you know how much any creature, other than yourself, suffers? We can't even say whether animals are self aware. Well, aside from Coco, who was trained to speak in sign language, and SHE proved to be self aware. Are you one of those with a direct line to God, and God has informed you of the sensitivities of all living creatures? Then, surely, God has removed all pain receptors from our domesticated animals, and we can safely slaughter and consume those creatures without causing any pain, or any fear.
(Score: 2) by julian on Friday June 02 2017, @03:35AM (5 children)
I feel like you're asking a biological question while demanding a metaphysical answer which cannot possibly be forthcoming. I don't really care about metaphysics, and I don't think you should either when it comes to this question. Your domains might not be well categorized.
Just extend the the idea to simpler forms of life. Do amoeba suffer? Do Bacteria? Viruses? I said insects suffer *less* than mammals. If you doubt that this is true then you're just being obtuse or incredibly pedantic.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 02 2017, @04:42AM (4 children)
Biologists know about lifeforms about as much as pianists know about wave mechanic. Check yoself.
(Score: 2) by julian on Friday June 02 2017, @04:57AM (3 children)
Please apply this same logic to selecting a car mechanic or heart surgeon so that you will not live long enough to reproduce.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 02 2017, @05:12AM (2 children)
My kids are probably older than you, punk.
(Score: 3, Touché) by julian on Friday June 02 2017, @05:14AM (1 child)
Well hopefully intelligence skips a generation
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 02 2017, @05:39AM
Don't you worry your little biologist head since you won't be reproducing. :)