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Researchers Create Artificial Insect Eye

Posted by CowboyNeal on Fri Apr 28, 2006 02:00 AM
from the fly-spy dept.
Graphics Science
maxzilla writes "An artificial insect eye that could be used in ultra-thin cameras has been developed by scientists in the US.The dimpled eye, contains over 8,500 hexagonal lenses packed into an area the size of a pinhead. The dome-shaped structure, described in the journal Science, is similar to a bee's eye. The researchers, from the University of California, Berkeley, say the work may also shed light on how insects developed such complex, visual systems. Darpa is also funding this project with applications expected for digital cameras and high speed motion detectors."
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  • Hooray! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Sathias (884801) on Friday April 28 2006, @02:09AM (#15219132)
    Now we won't have to provide blind insects with guide dogs!

      • Re:Hooray! (Score:2, Redundant)

        by Fred_A (10934)
        It just confirms that god currently works as a scientist in the US. Something we've known for a long time really... ;)
          • Sorry for feeding the troll, but :

            The biggest difference between having faith in some deity or having faith in selection/randomness/ifinite time/etc... is that in case of the second, you can also try to disect the subtle mechanics of it and try to understa

            • (NOTE: I *do* work in a genetic lab. A *do* know what I'm speaking about)

              I think you should be researching the sarcasm gene.

              • Troll or no, talkorigins addresses this. Read it sometime if you disagree with evolution, and reference it if you disagree with ID.

                Reshuffling requires random acts... when's the last time you conciously reshuffled your genes? Reshuffling is not evolution
            • Belief in god = retardation

              Tell that to the thousands of scientists who believe in God. Tell that to all of the evolutionists that believe in God. Believing in God doesn't mean believing in ID or creationism.

              Belief that you are better than everyone

            • ooh that's really logical, well done

  • And for their next trick... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by unitron (5733) on Friday April 28 2006, @02:19AM (#15219154) Homepage Journal
    "Researchers Create Artificial Insect Eye"

    When will they be getting around to the rest of the artificial insect?

    • Why build artificial insects when you can remote control cockroaches [wireheading.com]?

    • Re:And for their next trick... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by CRCulver (715279) <crculver@christopherculver.com> on Friday April 28 2006, @03:51AM (#15219369) Homepage

      When will they be getting around to the rest of the artificial insect?

      In his book The Age of Spiritual Machines [amazon.com] , futurist Ray Kurzweil ventures that the transformation of humans from flesh-and-blood to total machine bodies will start with small augmentations like this, proceeding step by step until everything original is replaced.

      [ Parent ]
      • In his book The Age of Spiritual Machines , futurist Ray Kurzweil ventures that the transformation of humans from flesh-and-blood to total machine bodies will start with small augmentations like this, proceeding step by step until everything original is r
        • I'm pretty sure the only thing that would stop people using artificial brains would be technical limitations, as well as being scared that they won't really be them once they're copied.. and in effect, moving to an artificial brain would kill you, even if
          • I'm pretty sure the only thing that would stop people using artificial brains would be technical limitations, as well as being scared that they won't really be them once they're copied.. and in effect, moving to an artificial brain would kill you, even if
        • Why not? A simple plastic one should suffice. It's not like most people use it.

          It will be the people with religious, political, and moral objections that will be the first ones to have their brains replaced (or at least modified) anyway.
      • though, saying that, if you replaced the brain a piece at a time, then you would likely still be 'alive', and you would still be you.. you wouldnt have to cut off your own brain functions, just slowly replace them.. and you wouldnt notice the difference..

  • Tables Turn (Score:3, Insightful)

    by d'alz (959455) <.dalz.rodrigues. .at. .gmail.com.> on Friday April 28 2006, @02:24AM (#15219166) Journal
    So we are competing with nature now. Very soon the blind will have a better option at vision and the rest of us will be scrambling in the dark. That would be a funny sight.

    • Re:Tables Turn (Score:3, Funny)

      by TubeSteak (669689)

      Very soon the blind will have a better option at vision and the rest of us will be scrambling in the dark.
      It's all fun and games until someone loses an eye...

      Then they get fitted with a broad-spectrum robo-eye & hunt you down in the middle of the night

  • I'll be impressed (Score:5, Funny)

    by Physician (861339) on Friday April 28 2006, @02:28AM (#15219179) Homepage
    I'll be impressed when they can transplant this eye into a poor blind insect.

  • Is it end of blindness? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 28 2006, @02:31AM (#15219183)
    Relevant stories has been on slashdot before here [slashdot.org] and here [slashdot.org] where scientists have successfully developed artificial eyes and implanted.

    The question, I want to ask is, is it still in research phase or professional services will start becoming available, when and how much it might cost?

    There is pool of blind people in developing countries like India, China and so on. The inofrmation might be useful for them too.

    [Posting anonymously to avoid karma whoring]

    • Re:Is it end of blindness? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by suv4x4 (956391)
      The question, I want to ask is, is it still in research phase or professional services will start becoming available, when and how much it might cost?

      The problem is all these are misleading. Articles about wiring cameras to the eye nerves, artificial eyes
      • [...] where for PR reasons the achievement is blown out of proportion for PR reasons [...]

        And the PR people work in the Department of Redundancy Department?

        • And the PR people work in the Department of Redundancy Department?

          Yes, however, I really wish the there are less grammar/sentence-flow nazys about my grammar and sentence flow really, however.

  • X-Files warned us of this (Score:3, Funny)

    by mitymidget (946765) on Friday April 28 2006, @02:46AM (#15219209) Homepage
    ...They didn't create it, dosn't anyone watch X-Files, its a discover lead by the Aliens, who will use the new eye to further the artificial development of insects to carry Alien genetic material to form the super Alien race (we all know humans are the most suppiorer already, just not intelectual). Comming soon, nanite insects that "Repair" damaged organs or tissue...Yeah Repair
    • As someone cleverly pointed out before on /. maybe we are those aliens ;) don't have to be too scared of someone else getting there first. It does also seem kind of ironic to spell superior as 'suppiorer', while claiming yourself to be superior. Someone ma
  • New viewing angle tecnique for movies - fly on the wall...
  • SEEE! This PROVES the eye is so complex that it requires an Intelligent Designer! :P
    • Ok so there's the Evolutionists, and the ID:ers, but other than Douglas Adams and myself, who else believes in the lesser known _Un-Intelligent (But Ambitious!) Designer_?

      And that would explain the disappearance of the dinosaurs too. Ooops, fucked it up. S
    • Nah, I'm sure they just found it in the bottom of a cupboard, where someone left a pile of batteries, microprocessors, motors, actuators, sensors and the like.. and they sorted themselves out naturally. Whoever left that pile there is the Creator though.
  • It's comforting to know that our future robot masters will have terrifying, alien faces with which to express their terrifying, alien throught processes.
      • as long as they have no physical interaction in the world, then we wont have much to fear from them, apart from having our credit revoked >_> everyone could just go back to working the land :p

  • Surveilance! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by putko (753330) on Friday April 28 2006, @03:25AM (#15219292) Homepage Journal
    If you thought those fiber-optic based surveillance cams were bad, you'll hate these even more.

    Yeah, this will find tons of apps in all sorts of useful places, but at a certain point, they'll be so cheap that you'll have to be afraid that people have hidden them somewhere, and that you are being watched.

    This will be like camera phones, but squared and then cubed.

  • Animal Inspired Optics (Score:2, Interesting)

    by stuckinarut (891702)
    It's not only insects we're mimicing, crustaceans too. Astronomers have investigated the eyes of lobsters and used the way they focus light to create a Lobster Telescope For X-Rays [sciencedaily.com]

  • A bit premature (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Fred_A (10934) <fred@wwna.nYEATSet minus poet> on Friday April 28 2006, @03:46AM (#15219357) Homepage
    According to TFA, "At the moment, the artificial eye is not connected to any kind of imaging device.".

    I understand that whoever made this thing is eager to show it around but shouldn't they actually wait until they have something to show ?
    It's becoming the norm nowadays to announce stuff that's only half done... I don't know if it's to satisfy investors or what but it sounds quite silly.

    "look, we have this great insectile artificial eye !"

    "impressive, what does it see ?"

    "we don't know"

    Well, duh.

  • Artificial insects: army of the future. (Score:4, Informative)

    by master_p (608214) on Friday April 28 2006, @04:28AM (#15219444)
    Future wars will not be faught by giant robots or ultra-enhanced bionic soldiers or UAVs. They will be faught by fleets of artificial insects with collaborative AI.

    Artificial insects are capable of a wide range of operations:

    1) psyops: killing the important people of the opposing force (leaders, generals, scientists, etc) would be as easy as sending an insectoid armed with deadly poison. Undetectable, it can sting its victim while the victim is sleeping, or goes to the bathroom, or is in a public place surrounded by thousands of people.

    2) blocking enemy forces: a swarm of insectoids can easily render whole armies inoperable in a blink of an eye: tanks, rocket launchers, comm centers can be rendered inoperable with few insectoids injecting the proper substances at the proper places.

    3) invading a land by only killing humans, living infrastructure intact.

    A swarm of insectoids can go undetected by radar, since insectoids can fly in small formations, and only joined at the destination.

    Nanomachines can be used to create billions of one-time insectoids at very low cost.

  • Been there. Done that. (Score:2, Informative)

    by elFisico (877213)
    Seems german scientists beat those US scientists to it. The team from the Fraunhofer Institute received a german research award for creating an artificial insect eye over a year ago.

    Find more technical infos here [tu-ilmenau.de] (sorry, german only).

  • Dump the sci-fi (Score:4, Insightful)

    by suv4x4 (956391) on Friday April 28 2006, @04:51AM (#15219483)
    Why is it that 99% of those articles try to be done with the boring facts as fast as possible and dive into the exciting world of "this may/can/will be used for [INSERT SOMETHING FROM A MOVIE OR SOMETHING THAT SOUNDS REALLY IMPORTANT]" speculation.

    So if a new sort of "no unpopped kernels" popcorns was disovered, we'll have to read how this will lead to us flying to distant galaxies and finding the purpose of existence.

      • Re:Dump the sci-fi (Score:4, Insightful)

        by suv4x4 (956391) on Friday April 28 2006, @09:50AM (#15220828)
        But in case of inventions (or rather tools, as is the case here), if the scientists are doing it at all, they will be doing it with some future goals in mind.

        Correct, but the articles lead many people (see grand-grandparent) to believe the invention is working and the practical implementation is about to happen, which is totally misleading.

        What we get is very small and (in the big picture) insignificant steps to solve the puzzle of bringing an invention in working state to the market, but we get breaking news that we're about to get flying cars every other week.

        People get tired, and start becoming suspicious. Is this what we want.
        [ Parent ]
  • into a matching display. Apple already has the patent [slashdot.org]

  • grammar (Score:2)

    by illtron (722358)
    "complex visual systems" not "complex, visual systems"
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