hi
i need a full report on ratbots

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Live rats driven by remote control

James Meek, science correspondent

Scientists have turned living rats into remote-controlled, pleasure-driven robots which can be guided up ladders, through ruins and into minefields at the click of a laptop key.
The project, which is funded by the US military's research arm, Darpa, was partly inspired by the September 11 terrorist attacks on the US, and partly by the earthquake in India last January.
Animals have often been used by humans in combat and in search and rescue, but not under direct computer-to-brain electronic control. The advent of surgically altered roborats marks the crossing of a new boundary in the mechanisation, and potential militarisation, of nature.
Scientists at the State University of New York (Suny) created the roborats by planting electrodes into their brains, a paper in today's edition of the journal Nature reports.
Two electrodes lead to the parts of the rats' brains which normally detect an obstacle against their whiskers. A third plunges into an area of the brain identified as far back as the 1950s as providing the rat with a feeling of pleasure when stimulated.
In 10 sessions the rats learned that if they ran forward and turned left or right on cue, they would be "rewarded" with a buzz of electrically delivered pleasure.
Once trained they would move instantaneously and accurately as directed, for up to an hour at a time. The rats could be steered up ladders, along narrow ledges and down ramps, up trees, and into collapsed piles of concrete rubble.
The Suny team suggests roborats fitted with cameras or other sensors could be used as search and rescue aids in natural disasters such as earthquakes, or in mine clearance.
Sanjiv Talwar, lead author of the Nature paper, said not only did the rats wearing electrodes feel no pain, but they were having a good time.
"If the rat moves left or right as commanded, it feels this burst of happiness," he said. "It follows this sort of cue very accurately. They work only for rewards. They love doing it."
The work on guided rats was an offshoot of earlier research which showed that animals wired up to a processor could command a robotic arm by thought alone, a development which could potentially empower paralysed humans.
Asked to speculate on potential military uses for robotic animals, Dr Talwar agreed they could, in theory, be put to some unpleasant uses, such as assassination.
"Is it possible, objectively? I would imagine, if anybody wanted to do something as absurd as that. But yes, surveillance is pretty straightforward, although for these sort of operations you could use robots. You could apply this to birds ... if you could fit birds with sensors and cameras and the like."
Michael Reiss, professor of science education at London's Institute of Education and a leading bioethics thinker, said: "It could be argued that we have, for 10,000 years or more, pushed farm animals around and directed their behaviour, but this clearly involves a degree of control and degree of invasiveness that in most people's eyes is a step change."
Prof Reiss said he was uneasy about humankind "subverting the autonomy" of animals. "There is a part of me that is not entirely happy with the idea of our subverting a sentient animal's own aspirations and wish to lead a life of its own."
Dr Talwar said that perhaps there needed to be a wider ethical debate.
But he argued that the roborat programme was not so far from training dogs. "The only thing different, and perhaps creepy, is that instead of whistling or giving food, you're directly tapping into the brain," he said.

references:

http://wireheadingroborats/ratbots.html
http://docs.googleviewer?a=v&q=cache:t7W...iC_eimW3ow

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Presented by:
R.NAVEEN

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[attachment=10965]
ABSTRACT
“Robot is an apparently human automation, intelligent but impersonal machine..."
A RATBOT or ROBORAT is a rat controlled through implants in its brain.
“Guided rats controlled through implants in their brains can be used to search for landmines or buried victims of earthquakes”.
An exciting and amazing experiment can be done by steering five rodents - so-called rat bots - through an obstacle course by remote control.
Writing in the journal Nature, we can say that the rat bots could reach places inaccessible to humans or machines.
One can think of the guided rat as a very good robot platform capable of traversing terrain that modern robots are unable to do.
The rodents in the first experiment wore a small electronics backpack that linked to electrodes in their brains. They received radio commands from a laptop that would stimulate sensations in their whiskers and reward/pleasure receptors to manipulate them into following pre-programmed routes. Some researchers propose using them to search for landmines or buried victims of earthquakes, as they can much more efficiently scout such areas than human rescuers or existing robots.
INTRODUCTION :
Rat - common name for any large member of a family of rodents, with dull - colored, coarse fur; long tails; large ears; and a pointed snout. Rats have extremely powerful teeth, with which they often gnaw through wooden planks to get at stores of food, and they have even been known to bite holes in lead pipes. They are usually nocturnal and live in human habitations, in forests, in deserts, and on seagoing ships. They are extremely prolific, breeding 1 to 13 times a year and producing 1 to 22 young in a litter. Most species of rats are herbivorous, but some are omnivorous. Rats have an average lifespan of eight months to one year in the wild and two to three years in captivity.
 Animals have often been used by humans in combat and in search and rescue, but not under direct computer-to-brain electronic control.
 The advent of surgically altered roborats marks the crossing new boundary in the mechanization, and potential militarization, of nature.
 This ratbot technology isn’t nanotechnology yet, and it is not new, as the principle of “MIND CONTROL” through implantable devices is the same
INTO THE TOPIC:
 Two electrodes lead to the parts of the rats' brains, which normally detect an obstacle against their whiskers. A third plunges into an area of the brain identified as far back as the 1950s as providing the rat with a feeling of pleasure when stimulated this area of stimulation is called Medial Forebrain Bundle (MFB)
 Once trained they would move instantaneously and accurately as directed, for up to an hour at a time. The rats could be steered up ladders, along narrow ledges and down ramps, up trees, and into collapsed piles of concrete rubble.
STEP WISE PROCEDURE OF HOW RATBOTS ARE BUILT….......
 Step-1
After anesthesia being given, the mouth of the rat is first cut in order to go through the incision towards Brain.
 Step-2
Now the incision continues towards to the head position to reach the brain
 Step-3
The Three electrodes used for stimulation are placed as shown beside
 Step-4
A Back Pack with batteries, an antenna, a receiver and a camera is placed to rat as shown beside
 Step-5
Finally the rat is molded into Ratbot and the only thing left with it is, it should be trained
HOW RATBOTS LOOK LIKE…
The remote control rats look like school children, wearing small backpacks that house microprocessor-based remote-controlled stimulators. Wires connect the backpack to tiny probes that have been placed into areas of the rat’s brain that are responsible for reward and areas that process signals from their whiskers. Manipulating these two areas of the brain controls the rats.
WORKING (OR) OPERATION OF RATBOT
SCIENTISTS OPINIONS (ABOUT RATBOT)
 It could save a lot of lives. It's not all bad for the rats because they feel pleasure when they go the right way
 Rats are small and can fit into places where we can’t. If it helps save lives then we should implement it.
APPLICATIONS
 Giant Rats Trained To Sniff Out Land Mines
 Roborat Could Help Find Earthquake Victims
THE FUTURE
This discovery grew out of ongoing research into the development of thought-controlled prosthetic devices, roboroach, moving a cursor using brain signal etc.,
EVOLUTION OF THE IDEA
The work on guided rats was an offshoot of earlier research which showed that animals wired up to a processor could command a robotic arm by thought alone, a development which could potentially empower paralyzed humans