Living in the Future

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Very cool!

Scientists Have Created the World’s Smallest, Lightest, and Fastest Fully Functional Micro-Robots (scitechdaily.com)

Two insect-like robots, a mini-bug and a water strider, developed at Washington State University, are the smallest, lightest and fastest fully functional micro-robots ever known to be created.

Such miniature robots could someday be used for work in areas such as artificial pollination, search and rescue, environmental monitoring, micro-fabrication, or robotic-assisted surgery. Reporting on their work in the proceedings of the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society’s International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems, the mini-bug weighs in at eight milligrams while the water strider weighs 55 milligrams. Both can move at about six millimeters a second.

I like living in the future.

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6 thoughts on “Living in the Future”

  1. “I like living in the future”

    How long before it gets weaponized? Might take something a bit larger to have enough of a payload but poison or a virus would be possible, I think.

  2. Until the FBI starts sending them into the houses of people they fear might be harboring incorrect views like Christianity or support problematic agendas like limited government.

    “You do not examine legislation technology in the light of the benefits it will convey if properly administered, but in the light of the wrongs it would do and the harms it would cause if improperly administered.”
    –Lyndon Johnson

    (I always got a kick out of the irony of the source of that quote. LBJ really should have heeded his own advice.)

      • Sounds a bit like Mutually Assured Destruction to me.

        Had a college professor who pooh poohed the theory of Technological Determinism so when a paper was required for another class dealing with societal development theories, I selected Tech Determinism just to tweak the first professor up. I will tell you that there is far more evidence for technology being at the root of every other social theory than you can imagine. Certainly more than those theories that the social scientists like to pontificate on. I think they do it because they have no real ability to grasp the nuances of technology and its future implications. In regards to the use of these micro robots, the horse is now out of the barn. It is going to be whoever catches the horse first that will set the major direction for their use.

  3. “Waiter, what’s this fly doing in my soup?”

    * Waiter peers at bowl of soup *

    “I’m not entirely sure, sir, but most likely topping off its fuel cell while scanning your cellphone for conservative content.”

  4. Could give new meaning to the question “Who put a bug up your butt?”.
    Also, define “fully functional”, kids.

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