Robot mosquitoes, dragonflies and dogs – DARPA plus contractors developing lethal toys
ran across this article a few days ago:
DARPA Backs This Insect-Like Military Drone, Could Fly in 2026 - autoevolution
“Unlike the Sikorsky design, which looks like a flying wing, the Northrop is shaped like some sort of crossbreed between a dragonfly and a mosquito. The central body, the place where the payloads will be located, is rather bulky and is flanked on either side by structures meant to support the two propellers.”
“As per current plans, DARPA intends to have a functional drone from the ANCILLARY program as soon as 2026. The main role of the aircraft will be to conduct intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) missions.”
Which rang a bell – not just because of the extensive use of drones and robots in the Ukraine/NATO/Russia war and the Iranian drone “swarming “and trailing missile attack on Israel – indicating the battlefield progression from hand to hand to autonomous, remotes warfare,
Here’s an image of a robot dog – a propos of nothing in particular:
Just prior to the C19 scamdemic we saw this story from 2019:
“Officials of the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in Arlington, Va., have awarded two contracts over the past two weeks for the SHort-Range Independent Microrobotic Platforms (SHRIMP) project.”
“DARPA on Monday awarded a potential $3.6 million contract to Honeywell International Inc. Automation and Control Solutions (ACS) division in Golden Valley, Minn.; and a potential $1.3 million contract on 25 Feb. 2019 to Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J., for separate technology thrusts of the SHRIMP program.”
“Key drivers are mobility, manipulation, actuator material, power storage and endurance, conversion circuitry, and engineering for extremely small size, weight, and power (SWaP)”
I have vague memories of implanting receptors in beetles to start and stop flight plus change direction – meaning the beetles could go anywhere. Their payload may have been limited, but I these days of nanotech delivery of synthetic snake venom, who knows where this technology has “progressed”.
That was five years ago.
Recent headlines like these occasionally surface:
New Neural Tech Could Power Insect-Sized Intelligent Flying Robots (dronexl.co)
“Researchers at Delft University of Technology have developed a groundbreaking neuromorphic vision-to-control system that enables autonomous drone flights. This new technology, which mimics the brain's biological processing, could pave the way for creating intelligent flying robots as small as insects.”
We have seen nanobot technology being developed that looks promising for seeking out cancer cells and putting them in a clam like structure:
(100) A new hope – cancer killing “origami” Clambots – fried not CRISPR’ed (substack.com)
I was hoping to see news on using the same technology to gobble up spike proteins without destroying cells and DNA,
We have also seen airborne vaccination techniques using self-replicating and evolving truncated viruses.
Maybe three will soon be a merger between nanobots and synthetic micro-organisms.
Can you imagine a robotic mosquito sucking your blood in order to refuel? That robot would be external, but technology is already focusing on using blood to power devices.
Your body, the battery: Powering gadgets from human “biofuel” | Ars Technica
“Staying alive guzzles energy. In order to keep us ticking, our bodies need to burn between 2,000 and 2,500 calories per day, which is conveniently enough to power a modestly used smart phone. So, if just a fraction of that energy could be siphoned, our bodies could in theory be used to run any number of electronic devices, from medical implants to electronic contact lenses—all without a battery in sight. Recently, researchers have taken important strides toward unlocking this electric potential.”
Research is happening in the field of synthetic blood also.
Synthetic blood to power vascularized robots – Softbites
“In a recent issue of Nature, they present an aquatic soft robot with a synthetic circulatory system which provides chemical energy. The synthetic blood has zinc and iodide ions that make it electrically conducting (like an electrolytic blood), and powers an artificial heart (a pump that circulates “blood” throughout the robot body).”
All possibly conflating into the creation of new life forms – plug in some fast-learning AI and which species is superior now?
“Abiogenesis is the natural process by which life arises from non-living matter, such as simple organic compounds. The prevailing scientific hypothesis is that the transition from non-living to living entities on Earth was not a single event, but a process of increasing complexity involving the formation of a habitable planet, the prebiotic synthesis of organic molecules, molecular self-replication, self-assembly, autocatalysis, and the emergence of cell membranes. The transition from non-life to life has never been observed experimentally, but many proposals have been made for different stages of the process.”
Life, but not as we know it!
I had hoped to see news about nanotechnology gobbling up micro ad nano-plastics in the oceans – without destroying mammas, fish and sea life (like plankton) but the emphasis looks to be on poisoning or killing people rather than healing them.
We already know that solar panel plantations and forests of wind turbines on land and sea decimate wildlife and wipe out endangers species – whilst increasing global temperatures– looks like that is the objective of all this directed research.
Side note: Is anyone else wondering why – after all the subsidies and tax breaks – that wind and solar are not free to all – bringing down the overall average price of energy, not increasing it to five times that of hydrocarbon energy?
Onwards!!!
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I bet Lockheed Martin in Syracuse was working on flying insects a few years ago. I was living in Baldwinsville and smashed a bug , no guts, broke like a tinker toy .