MEMS 2008, the conference for the tiny movable devices called micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) manufactured through microfabrication technology, was held in Tucson, Arizona, the US, January 13-17, 2008. A large number of papers dealt with MEMS-based sensors used as interfaces between biological and external systems, such as by embedding them in organisms. Research is oriented towards assisting, improving or otherwise affecting biological functions such as vision.
Especially
intriguing was a paper by the University of Michigan on the Cyborg
Beetle (see Fig), a beetle controlled like a radio-controlled airplane
by implanting an integrated circuit (IC), antenna and other components
in it. There were other papers dealing with controlling beetle flight,
but the University of Michigan's paper surpassed the others in its
level of completion.
The University of Michigan mounted a North American unicorn beetle with an IC, button battery and a flight direction indicator consisting of ten light emitting diodes (LED), and succeeded in controlling its flight with accuracy by external control.
Flight control was handled by inserting electrodes into a portion of the brain immediately behind the beetle's eye, and into wing muscles, and injecting pulsed voltage. Video clips were shown during the presentation of launching the beetle from a stationary position, and directing it left/right and up/down in flight. The LED directional controller was a separate control system from the electrodes, and instead utilized the beetle's proclivity to follow a blinking light.
To minimize injury to the beetles, the University of Michigan inserted the electrodes in the pupae stage. Pupae have relatively fluid internal tissues, capable of forming around the electrodes, with the result that 80% of embedded beetles developed wings and lived relatively long (about three weeks). If electrodes are embedded after the beetle reaches its adult form, however, most specimens die in about three days.
Other papers presented at MEMS 2008 included one by the University of Washington on an ultra-miniature display created by forming LEDs, together with wiring and other components, on a contact lens; and research by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) on implanting a radio frequency identification (RFID) tag into a rabbit's eyeball to extract information from an artificial retina. This type of research is expected to become an increasingly crucial field in the future for electronics.
by Tetsuo Nozawa
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