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Rex, the world’s most complete bionic man
Social psychologist Bertolt Meyer, who has a prosthetic hand himself, with ‘Rex’. Reuters Sea urchin shows how to reduce CO2 Trends Prof Yash
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Rex, the world’s most complete bionic man WHEN Luke Skywalker received a perfect bionic replacement for the hand that was cut off in Star Wars Episode V, the idea of replicating human organs and body parts seemed far-fetched. Thirty years later, the idea is no longer just science fiction. Scientists, among them the creators of “Rex” — the world’s most complete bionic man, unveiled in London this week — believe they can now replicate about two-thirds of the human body. “We were surprised how many of the parts of the body can be replaced,” said Rich Walker, managing director of the robotics team Shadow, who built Rex. “There are some vital organs missing, like the stomach, but 60 to 70 per cent of a human has effectively been rebuilt.” This is heralded, then, as the dawn of the age of bionic man — although specialists caution that we are still feeling our way. Social psychologist Bertolt Meyer, who also worked on Rex, has an interesting perspective: he was born without his left hand and has a prosthesis. “I have looked for new bionic technologies out of personal interest for a long time and I think that until five or six years ago, nothing much was happening,” he said. “Suddenly we are at a point where we can build a body that is great and beautiful in its own special way.” Not everyone in the field believes the recent progress, impressive as it is, places us on the road to complete replication of human limbs, organs and tissue. “We have motors which can lift things but, if you want to mimic the dexterity of a hand, we are not there yet,” said Prof. Steven Hsiao of the John Hopkins University in Baltimore. “What we are beginning to achieve is building prostheses which look like human body parts, but we are a long way away from making ones which relay sensory information the way the human body does.” Professor Hsiao drew the comparison between Star Wars and real life, saying: “The goal is the scene in the film where Luke Skywalker gets his new hand tested and is able to feel pain: we are not there. In 10 years, we will be able to build a robot which has the dexterity to pick up a pen and write with it, but it will not be able to send back sensory information.” Rex, billed as the pinnacle of robotics achievement to date, will be on public display until March 11 at the Science Museum in London. Dubbed the ‘Million-Dollar Man’ (that’s how much he cost to make), he consists of a prosthetic face, hips, knees, feet and hands, all of which are commercially available. Other off-the-shelf items include an artificial retina, cochlea and heart. Rex’s other internal organs, among them a pancreas, a set of artificial lungs and bladder, are still in development. Some of the technology cannot work without human input; bionic hands, for example, need muscles and signals from the brain to function. Other parts, such as the heart and pancreas, are designed to work on their own. Other body parts remain out of the reach of scientists. Walker says: “The only artificial stomach we have seen is very large and generates electricity, so you couldn’t use it to replace a human stomach, but I am sure there are people in the regenerative medicine community working on that.” And replication of the human brain, the most complex structure known to man, was not even on the radar, Walker said. “This is a showcase for prosthetic parts, it shows exactly where we’ve got to in being able to replace parts of a human.” Bertolt Meyer adds: “I’d say it’s highly unlikely that, in our lifetimes or in that of our grandchildren, we will see a fully articulate human body with an artificial intelligence.” Meyer said there would be ethical issues surrounding prostheses if they began to outperform human body parts. “Should I be allowed to cut off my real hand and replace it with something, does that gives me an unfair advantage over people who cannot afford this? I’m not saying that is going to happen but these are questions that should be on the table before that technology becomes available.” — The Independent
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Sea urchin shows how to reduce CO2 A study of the humble sea urchin has shown British scientists a process that could revolutionise efforts to reduce carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, the principal cause of climate change. Experts at Newcastle University discovered that sea urchins employ nickel to make use of the CO2 in the ocean, in order to form its calcareous shell, according to a study published in the Catalysis Science & Technology magazine. Physicist Lidija Siller said the discovery was made entirely by chance and led them to add tiny particles of nickel to a solution of water and CO2, and then saw how the carbon dioxide disappeared completely. In the presence of a catalyst of nickel, CO2 turns into calcium carbonate or magnesium carbonate, innocuous minerals present in the earth’s crust that are used in construction to make cement and other materials, and in hospitals to make plaster casts, the study said. The method invented by the British experts consists of making the CO2 that industries send into the atmosphere pass directly from the factory smokestack to a column of water rich in nickel nanoparticles, and afterwards recovering the solid calcium carbonate that sinks to the bottom. While the process would not work in all cases, it is a cheap, effective solution that could be available worldwide for some heavily polluting industries, Siller said. —
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Trends WASHINGTON: A pair of big, blimp-like craft, moored to the ground and flying as high as 10,000 feet, are to be added to a high-tech shield designed to protect the Washington D.C. area from air attack, at least for a while. The bulbous, helium-filled “aerostats” — each more than three quarters the length of a football field at 243 feet — are to be stitched into existing defences as part of an exercise of new technology ordered by the Defense Department. The coming addition to the umbrella over Washington is known as Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor System, or JLENS. Raytheon Co is the prime contractor. Rocket blasts off with new NASA communications satellite CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida: An unmanned Atlas 5 rocket blasted off on Wednesday to put the first of a new generation of NASA communications satellites into orbit, where it will support the International Space Station, the Hubble Space Telescope and other spacecraft. The 191-foot rocket lifted off at 8:48 pm, the first of 13 planned launches in 2013 from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station just south of NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.
Arctic nations’ oil spill plans too vague OSLO: Plans by Arctic nations to start cooperating over oil spills are vague and fail to define corporate liability for any accidents in an icy region opening up to oil and gas exploration due to global warming, environmentalists said. A 21-page document by the eight-nation Arctic Council, seen by Reuters and due to be approved in May, says countries in the region “shall maintain a national system for responding promptly and effectively to oil pollution incidents.” It does not say what that means in terms of staff, ships, clean-up equipment or corporate liability in a remote region that the US Geological Survey estimates has 13 per cent of the world's undiscovered oil and 30 per cent of its undiscovered gas. Dung beetles look to the stars JOHANNESBURG: A species of South African dung beetle has been shown to use the Milky Way to navigate, making it the only known animal that turns to the galactic spray of stars across the night sky for direction. But scientists have puzzled over how the beetles, which perform an orientation dance on top of their dung balls before setting off, achieve a straight line on moonless nights. To prove the Milky Way theory, scientists at Johannesburg’s Wits University took beetles into the university planetarium to see how they fared with a normal night sky, and then one devoid of the Milky Way. “The dung beetles don’t care which direction they’re going in. They just need to get away from the bun fight at the poo pile,” Wits professor Marcus Byrne said. “But when we turned off the Milky Way, the beetles got lost.” And on cloudy nights without a moon or stars? “They probably just stay at home,” Byrne said. — Reuters |
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THIS UNIVERSE Was the American moon landing genuine or hoax? Why is sonar used for the detection of submarines under water? Sonar can detect sound. Submarines travelling under water do make sound; this is due to engines of the submarine as also the turbulence produced in water.
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WHEN Luke Skywalker received a perfect bionic replacement for the hand that was cut off in Star Wars Episode V, the idea of replicating human organs and body parts seemed far-fetched.
Thirty years later, the idea is no longer just science fiction. Scientists, among them the creators of “Rex” — the world’s most complete bionic man, unveiled in London this week — believe they can now replicate about two-thirds of the human body.
