In the aftermath of a natural disaster, every moment matters. First responders often have mere minutes to find survivors buried under collapsed buildings or trapped in earthquake rubble. So Alper Bozkurt, a bioelectrical engineer at North Carolina State University, is recruiting emergency personnel from a speedy but unlikely community: cockroaches.
To build his “cyber cockroaches," Bozkurt straps tiny backpacks containing microchips onto the insects. As he explains in this episode of Cyborg Nation, after an earthquake, the scientists behind the CyberRoach project can use remote controls to move the bugs in different directions, exploring the nooks and crannies underneath rubble to locate survivors and broadcast their coordinates back to a human rescue team.
CyberRoach is just the start of training insects to bring us information from the spaces humans cannot go; DARPA has started funding research for using beetles as surveillance drones. Interested in training your own roach to spy on your neighbor’s whereabouts? For your next DIY project, buy a CyberRoach kit—no insect included. (For a volunteer subject, try looking under your fridge. On second thought, don't.)
