Sperm Could Power Nanobots

Lucas123 writes "According to MSNBC, scientists are experimenting with using a sperm's flagellum to overcome the problem of supplying energy to nanobots that could be implanted in the body as smart probes that would release disease-fighting drugs, monitor enzymes and perform other medical roles within a patient's body. Powered by a compound called adenosine triphosphate or ATP, a sperm's flagellum can propel it at about 7 inches an hour. Energy from ATP could also power the pumps charged with dispensing the medication at a certain rate from the nanobots."

Think of the possibilities...

[DragonPup]

...of making your insurance provider to cover your porn costs so you can power your nanobots!

Powering Fembots (Movie with Tilda Swinton?)

[StCredZero]

How about sperm powered fembots? They could remake this movie!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0270688/plotsummary [imdb.com]

Sperm isn't the fuel. ATP is.

[Anonymous Coward]

ATP is the fuel for muscles. Trying to use ATP to power nanobots has absolutely nothing to do with sperm in particular.

Sensationalist summaries

[Spy der Mann]

ATP is the fuel for muscles. Trying to use ATP to power nanobots has absolutely nothing to do with sperm in particular.

Hey, what did you expect? We need those kind of headlines here in digg. Oh, wait...

The good news

[Anonymous Coward]

is your cancer is completely gone.

The bad news is you're pregnant.

Re:Think of the possibilities...

[pnutjam]

You can bet, if insurance cover its, they will find an efficient and unappealing way to harvest. :(

That's great an all...

[Serenissima]

But where on Earth can they possibly find enough sperm?

Re:That's great an all...

[meringuoid]

Sperm-powered robots on the hunt for fuel? Well, somehow I think the anime writes itself, don't you?

Re:

[andphi]

If by "writes" you mean "ties bedroom scenes together with something resembling plot (in the same way that the heroine of the story wears something resembling clothing)", then yes, it does write itself. But I wouldn't want to be caught dead in the same room with the DVD of it.

Re:That's great an all...

[Serenissima]

Well, naturally, you'd want to be caught alive in the same room! Having someone find your dead body in a room with that playing on the DVD player would raise some interesting questions... Like "What was he doing so furiously that his heart stopped?"

Re:That's great an all...

[andphi]

I can see it now. Gil Grissom and that Assistant ME David are looking down at my corpse. Gil looks at the box, unopened, and the DVD player, which isn't turned on. Gil says: "Well, this is new." David says: "Preliminary cause of death: exsanguination from these explosive contusions on the face, neck, and chest. No other signs of trauma." That new chick who replaced Sara: "This is so weird. What's your theory, Grissom?" Gil: "I don't have theories, just evidence." and then, in voice over: "Go away, new chick, and don't come back without Sara. I want my Sara back you dumb, overly perky evidence-bunny."

Nick discovers that I didn't order the DVD and don't even own a PAL compatible DVD player. Greg comments on the eclectic but basically porn-free movie collection. "Lots of anime, sci-fi, and fantasy, but no pr0n, unless Ghost in the Shell is pr0n." Greg then tells an unrelated story about being severely embarassed. Nick speculates on the incidence of murder by pr0n and Greg goes off on another Las Vegas underworld history lesson.

Later, Hodges, in another fit of self-importance, concludes: "He died of embarassment." Gil looks at him with that signature "Thank you, Hodges, for telling me what we already knew" look on his face and then, in voice over: "Go away Hodges, and don't come back, ever. I want Lab Greg back, even if it means having to deal with two Gregs"

Re:That's great an all...

[andphi]

I probably would be. However, this premise doesn't seem to lend itself to that kind of hentai.

Already exists...

[SanityInAnarchy]

The plot didn't involve nanotech directly, but it did have quotes like "I need your active molecules! Please, deposit them in the front slot!"

Ahem... or so I'm told.

Re:

[QuietLagoon]

Sperm-powered robots on the hunt for fuel?

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/life/main/5414105.html [chron.com]

Re:

[The Great Pretender]

I, for one, welcome our new sperm-powered nano-robot overlords.

Re:That's great an all...

[badran]

Well Most people here suddenly find them selves a tad more useful to the world...

Re:

[everphilski]

a Lucy Liu Robot [wikipedia.org], in a future when men date robots?

Re:

[BillGod]

My sheets will be the next oil fields of Saudi Arabia... If only they were worth the same.

In that case

[WilyCoder]

In that case my ex could run a power plant.

Re:

[EnsilZah]

Don't you mean a Breeder Reactor?

Re:In that case

[WilyCoder]

The colloquial term is 'cum-guzzling whore', but we can skip the semantics :)

Re:

[commodoresloat]

and where might we find this, erm, energy collector? please post pics and email address or myspace link....

Sperm life?

[Turn-X Alphonse]

How long would sperm be able to live though? I believe it's about 3 days in an ideal environment (vagina), how would it work in a hostile one like a nanobot?

Re:Sperm life?

[pembo13]

I could be wrong, but the vagina is a hostile environment to sperm -- it produces natural spermicides.

Re:

[Turn-X Alphonse]

Some vaginas are too acidic and hence hostile, but in general they aren't hostile to it, other wise pregnancy would be extremely difficult.

Re:Sperm life?

[Bryansix]

No, they are all hostile. That is why sperm gels up in the seminal fluid shortly after release and then springs into black-ops when the coast is clear to enter the cervix.

Re:Sperm life?

[Albert Sandberg]

.. now this thread is something I thought would never appear on slashdot. And modded informative/insightful all over the place? Hell just froze ;)

Re:Sperm life?

[maroberts]

Slashdot readers know all about the scientific details of sex. They just haven't experienced it personally (at least not with a member of the opposite sex).

Re:

[Oktober Sunset]

with a non-inflatable person.

Re:

[davidsyes]

This para sounds like "armed cervixes". Counter insurgency springs to mind.

Also, when I was new to "The Nav", one of the first things I heard (and thought was, umm, "nuts", as in crazy) was:

"Hey, who's the Duty Cum Pumper?" That was a title for the "'girl'/male whore" on duty, the one who (jokingly) would suck off whoever else was on duty." (My first ship (that ship) was all-male crewed.)

Sailors say the darndest things...

Re:

[Nimey]

ROFL. Gotta love military humor.

Re:

[ArsenneLupin]

Indeed. The male anus is so much more friendly to sperm. But somehow pregnancy is still difficult...

Re:

[thewils]

Not so - you do know this is how lawyers are conceived, right?

Re:Sperm life?

[fbjon]

Pregnancy is surprisingly difficult.

Re:Sperm life?

[TekPolitik]

Pregnancy is surprisingly difficult.

Nah, you just have to have the right environment. Based on years of intensive research into the matter and the work of the major scholars in this area - Maury Povich and Jerry Springer - the right environment is a trailer park.

Re:Sperm life?

[Lost Race]

It's only difficult if you want it. If you don't it's ridiculously easy.

Re:

[pembo13]

Don't know what you've heard, but considering the number of sperm released and the number required to actually fertilize the egg, pregnancy is extremely difficult.

Re:

[Chas]

No. Sperm will NOT live three days in the vagina. Too acidic, too hostile.

The mean lifetime of three days are sperm that survive long enough to move into the fallopian tubes.

Re:

[reverseengineer]

Well, presumably, all that would be used for nanomachinery is the "motor" of the sperm, just the flagellum and the glycolytic machinery to power it. Those pieces are nearly pure protein, and should be fairly hardy in a biological environment, and could perhaps be engineered to be more so.

The reason sperm die so quickly is simply that they've been pared down to the essentials of independent survival, and are so tailored to their mission that additional survival measures would probably make them less fit a

Re:

[cp.tar]

If I recall correctly, the pH of the vagina has some effect on the probability of a male vs. a female child being concieved.

I no longer recall whether the X or Y sperms prefered a more acidic environment, but allegedly female gorillas eat certain foods in order to adjuct their vagina's pH so as to favour one or the other.
And certain other foods in order to induce an abortion, but that's not pertinent.
Not to mention that in certain discussions it may well be considered flamebait.

Close the door!

[Benanov]

Leave me alone, I'm trying to save sick children in Africa!

fap fap fap

(Yes, I know they wouldn't be using actual sperm, merely copying it. But it's still a funny mental image.)

Re:

[JContad]

Leave me alone, I'm trying to save sick children in Africa!

I am pretty conflicted on whether to laud or loathe you for thinking of the children.

Obligatory...

[doi]

I for one welcome our new, sticky, nano-robotic overlords!

Re:

[oahazmatt]

I for one welcome our new, sticky, nano-robotic overlords!

It's just too bad that once you've gotten them fully powered, you'll be blind and won't be able to bear witness to the wonderful future you worked so hard for.

Sort of like ...

[Tribbin]

Sort of like a cyborg sperm-cell; wicked.

I do NOT want to read the comments!

[Tsu Dho Nimh]

I'm afraid that there is no lower limit to the depths to which /.ers can or will go.

Re:

[SanityInAnarchy]

At least we're not Fark, right?

Oh wait, now that I've actually read the comments...

Re:

[Spy der Mann]

At least we're not Fark, right?

Not news: New nanotech fuel discovered...
Still not news: with a misleading headline...
News: It's sperm.
Fark: As read in Slashdot.

Robotic structure wrapped in living sperm.

[Bruce McBruce]

'Come' with me if you want to live.

One problem....

[edwardpickman]

How do you train them to run in a nano hamster wheel.

If only the Wachowski Brothers had known this

[ciaohound]

the "Matrix" premise of robots using human beings as "batteries" might have been made a little more plausible... if slightly more disgusting.

Re:

[davidsyes]

Who knows? Maybe they DID surmise this, but decided against becoming known as the "Wack chow-ski" brothers...?

Masturbot

[Foofoobar]

I call dibs on the name Masturbot (c) 2007

Re:

[Bryansix]

I call dibs on the name Masturbot (c) 2007

It's now 2008 in case you didn't notice.

Re:Masturbot

[Foofoobar]

Yeah but I whipped out that trademark last year and been beating it for the last month til this post came onto the scene.

Re:

[Foofoobar]

You can have that name when you pry it from my cold dead fingers.

cold dead sticky fingers... eeeewww!

Re:

[Foofoobar]

In robotics, a masturbot is a specialized type of robot that is designed to erotically stimulate itself whenever it is not preoccupied by any other function of sufficiently great relative importance. http://uncyclopedia.org/wiki/Masturbot [uncyclopedia.org]

I guess those bots "get around" with a lot of....

[davidsyes]

... Spunk...

Spurts & sprints?

Smooth, or chunky?

Choosy Bots work in a jiffy..

A bugfix to y'all slashdotters

[Anonymous Coward]

--- slashcode.orig 2008-01-02 21:36:25.174107170 +0200
+++ slashcode 2008-01-02 21:36:55.919425508 +0200
@@ -1,3 +1,3 @@
  a) wank
  b) wipe keyboard with tissue
-c) throw tissue into garbage bin
+c) sell tissue to pharmaceutical company

Re:

[jalet]

You forgot :

+d) Profit !

Sperm as an energy source won't work

[Bloater]

This is just another crackpot perpetual moisten machine.

Come again?

[Doomstalk]

Well, I guess it's worth a shot...

Funny...

[EvilSporkMan]

I seem to be able to propel sperm about 7 inches in the space of a few seconds.

Re:Funny...

[Curze]

All I know is this puts an entirely more hilarious spin on "Transformers, More than meets the eye!"

Re:

[SoulRider]

Damn, your quick. It takes me about 6 minutes.

Peanut Butter Cups

[mcpkaaos]

Scientist A: You got sperm on my nanobot!
Scientist B: You got your nanobot in my sperm!

...

Well...

[MSTCrow5429]

...who says science isn't sexy?

What a moronic story.

[jonnythan]

This isn't about powering nanobots with sperm. It's about looking at sperm's locomotive method and adapting it to nanobots.

I'm not really sure why the article talks about sperm, specifically, but ATP is used all over the human body to do virtually everything, including move muscles.

Re:

[Paradigm_Complex]

'cuz sex sells (page views, advertisements)

Re:What a moronic story.

[LanMan04]

I'm not really sure why the article talks about sperm, specifically...

Maybe because sperm are the only cells in the human body use flagella to locomote, which is what these nanobots are supposed to do?

Re:

[Jack9]

Escherichia coli would have something to say about that. Why do sperm get all the glory when they are horribly inefficient and dumb to boot?

Re:

[LanMan04]

Well, the only human cell, anyway. I stand pedantically corrected! :)

I for one

[superwiz]

...welcome our sperm overlords? No, no,no....

Sounds like a cool hardware hack though.

Animal experimentation is WRONG ;)

[ari_j]

No animals were harmed in the making of this robot. (At least the animals didn't complain!)

Re:

[wpiman]

No way are they injecting me with that.....

Just Equip the Nanobots with Mitochondria

[Zymergy]

Mitochondria are the manufacturers of nearly all ATP (Adenosine TriPhosphate) in the body... Just find a way to incorporate them "cybernetically" with the flagellated nanobots and you would need to just add simple sugars to power your sperm-tailed nanobots. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrion [wikipedia.org]

Of course, I can see a possible application... A new form of Cybernetic birth-control, where nanobots kill any real sperm that try to inseminate the egg, acting like a phalanx to prevent fertilization. (Or the

Re:

[Bourbon Man]

Even better, equip the nanobots with midichlorians, and you can have Nano-Jedi-Bots!

Re:

[Applekid]

(Or they could attack the egg, killing it. But that would have even more theologians up in arms... there are millions of sperm but (typically) only one egg.)

No more than The Pill, anyway.

Am I the only one who read this and imagined a Fantastic Voyage-style attack submarine shooting lasers at a comparatively huge ovum?

Do your part!

[ryanvm]

Excellent. In the name of science I vow to triple my current sperm production output. Hmmm - I wonder if I can get a grant...

Obligatory Three Panel Soul

[Sentry21]

http://www.threepanelsoul.com/view.php?date=2007-11-13 [threepanelsoul.com]

Sperm Bourse

[Jedi Holocron]

Of course, it'll only a matter of time till the SPEC (Sperm Producing and Exporting Countries) cartel forms and sets up the first Sperm Bourse.

Pricing will be in Jizzars and sold by the Bukakke.

Oral Application

[aplusjimages]

if you put that in my mouth I'm definitely spitting it out.

Important for two reasons

[hyades1]

"...a sperm's flagellum to overcome the problem of supplying energy to nanobots that could be implanted in the body as smart probes..."

For the first time since the beginning of recorded civilization, the words "sperm" and "smart" have been found in the same sentence.

Not to mention that the profound financial implications of sperm as energy bring a whole new meaning to the term "sperm bank". I call dibs on "Canada Thrust" and "Bank of Nova Scrotum".

Powering Nanobots?

[StarfishOne]

Sooo... that was the hidden plan of Seven of Nine!

Creating an army of nanobot overlords by trying to seduce Harry Kim!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85O6HISsUTk [youtube.com]

The Borg!!

[isotope23]

So now we know why the Borg were so hot for ASSimilation.....

Ta Dum Dum!!

Move 7 inches in an hour?

[Bimkins]

If this is the same measuring of 7" that most guys use, then these things will probably top out at about 4" or 5"...

Re:Move 7 inches in an hour?

[Chosen Reject]

True, but if it's the same measuring of one hour that most guys use, then these things will do that 4" in about 60 seconds, so it turns out for the best.

Zinc and celery, here I come..........

[AbRASiON]

Peter North could power a small factory then couldn't he?

Damn, best news I've ever heard!!!

[failedlogic]

I don't ever plan on having children now that I can donate all day long to science!

Sperm Powered Nanobots

[wcrowe]

"Sperm Powered Nanobots" would be a great name for a rock band...

samples

[Thaelon]

Do they need some samples?

Once again

[Joe Snipe]

I misread this as "spam powered nanobots"

Those kooky scientists

[obeythefist]

Those kooky scientists will try anything to get laid! Just wait until the dean hears about this!

"Hey baby, fancy a hot nanobot injection?"

Thermodynamics is False?

[xrayspx]

So great, now we've got a Geek Propetual Motion Machine.

cookie cutter science

[Goldsmith]

Makes one (1) Tenured Professor:

1. Find proteins.
2. Attach to a surface (his tags work well).
3. Make link to nanotechnology (half-baked links are easier).
4. Put out a press release claiming to be the first person to put proteins on a surface.

Congratulations, you're tenured!

I'll do my part.

[talksinmaths]

"Kif, clear my schedule."
 

Probable Conversation ....

[PPH]

... at the average Slashdotter's house.

Mother (yelling down basement stairs): "What are you doing down there?"

Slashdotter: "Recharging the robots!"

Don't you mean . . .

[StefanJ]

. . . "wanking" hours?

Thanks, I'll be here all week, try the hummous infused polenta medallions.

Re:

[Who235]

Thanks, I'll be here all week, try the hummous infused polenta medallions.

I don't know about anyone else, but I'm not trying anything at your restaurant.

Re:

[lilomar]

Do you mean palm grease as in $$$? Or palm grease as in KY?