Scientists Use Video Game Tech to Remotely Control Cockroaches on Autopilot [VIDEO]

A team of researchers from the North Carolina State University has used video game technology to remotely control cockroaches on autopilot so that they can be used in rescue operations in disasters sites.

By incorporating the motion sensing Kinect system, designed by Microsoft, into an electronic interface they remotely steered the cockroaches with a computer. Kinect was designed for Xbox 360 video game consoles.

The roaches are plugged in with a digitally plotted path and with the help of kinect they identify and track the progress made by the insect. Then the tracking data provided by kinect is used to automatically steer the roach along the required path.

"Our goal is to be able to guide these roaches as efficiently as possible, and our work with kinect is helping us do that," says Dr. Alper Bozkurt, an assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at NC State. "We want to build on this program, incorporating mapping and radio frequency techniques that will allow us to use a small group of cockroaches to explore and map disaster sites."

Bozkurt, co author of the paper, states that the roaches will be controlled by the autopilot program that will guide them to efficient routes and offer rescuers a complete view of the situation.

The roaches will also be able to detect survivors in a collapsed building or other disaster sites with the help of sensors such as microphones that they are supplied with. The researchers also plan to fix micro speakers in the roaches so that the rescuers can communicate with the people trapped under debris.

Prior to this, the same team had designed a technology that used electronic interface to remotely control cockroaches. But this is the first time that they are using kinect to develop an autopilot program and track how roaches respond to electrical impulses.

The researchers have wired the interface to the roach's antennae and cerci, which are sensory organs present on the insect's abdomen that detect motion in air and caution the insect of a predator's approach. But in this the wires attached to the cerci are used for motion. Small charges are discharged from the wires attached to the antennae that trick the insect into thinking that the antennae is in contact with a obstacle and guide them in an opposite direction.

The paper titled, "Kinect-based System for Automated Control of Terrestrial Insect Biobots," will be presented on July 4 in Osaka, Japan at the Remote Controlled Insect Biobots Mini symposium at the 35th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society.