Science is hard. Once you’ve created cyborg cockroaches, you have to think about if they can swim. No worries…scientists have built a tiny 3D-printed scuba suit for cyborg cockroaches, letting them survive and move underwater for up to three hours. Researchers at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore and Waseda University in Japan shared the work in a new paper in Nature Communications. Cyborg insects combine a living bug with electrodes that let people remotely steer its movements. They use less energy than regular robots since they move with their own muscles, and they are small enough to squeeze through tight, cluttered spaces.
Such cyborgs have even helped in real search-and-rescue operations, including after the March earthquake in Myanmar. The catch is that they still need oxygen, which limits their use in water; the cyborg cockroach scuba suit fixes that. Cockroaches breathe through tiny holes called spiracles, so the team built a flexible shell that wraps the insect’s body, with small tubes feeding oxygen directly to those holes. An attached tank slowly makes oxygen through a chemical reaction.
Source: Gizmodo
