About Ulaglandha Perumal Expertise I can clear doubts regarding the areas of nanotecnology where there is much of Electronics because I am doing work in Nanoids.Most of other bio-nano related questions can also be cleared.
Experience I am currently working towards my own goal in the Nanoid domain.
Expert: Ulaglandha Perumal Date: 3/20/2005 Subject: Naniods and the brain
Question I've heard that there is only a few percent of the brain ever used at one time (it increases in epileptic fits and then rapidly decreases) would it be possible in the future to activate the whole of the brain and centeral nervous system via nanotechnology in the blood activating small electric currents to the brain to slowly activate it fully or is this not possible ?
Answer Dear Friend,
Mind-control units could be implanted to make people behave in desired ways. The creation of a ‘roborat' with implanted electrodes in the rat's brain to make it move in controlled directions was reported in the journal Nature in May this year. This is a graphic demonstration of how implantable devices can compromise the most distinguishing hallmark of any organism, let alone a human being: the possession of autonomous purpose and will.
Roborat and implantable ‘mind-control'
A team of scientists implanted electrodes in the rat's brain to control its movements, treating it effectively as a robot, making it do things it would never do willingly on its own.
John Chapin, professor of physiology and pharmacology at the State University of New York in Brooklyn, who heads the team, envisages using the roborat, armed with a miniature camera, to search for survivors in collapsed buildings, for example, "There's no robot that exists now that would be capable of going down into such a difficult terrain," he says.
Five rats have been implanted, each with three electrodes and a power-pack on the animal's back. When signalled from a labtop computer, two of the electrodes stimulate the rat's brain and cue it either to go right or left. The rat has had to be trained, and when it moves in the desired direction, it is rewarded by stimulation to a third electrode implanted in the ‘pleasure centre' of the brain. When only the pleasure centre is stimulated, the rat goes straight ahead.
The rats' movements can be controlled 1 600 feet away. After training, the rats could be remotely guided through pipes and across elevated runways. They could be compelled to climb trees and ladders and to jump from heights. The animals could even be commanded to venture into brightly lit, open areas that they would normally avoid.
It isn't nanotechnology yet, and it is not new, though the principle of involuntary ‘mind-control' through implantable devices is the same. Chapin's team strapped tiny video cameras to the rats to see whether they might be used to transmit images and sounds of people trapped inside ruins. But Chapin says the camera needs to be refined to compensate for the rats' jerky movements and the power backpack has to be miniaturized, for implanting beneath the skin.
According to a report in Wired magazine, Howard Eichenbaum, professor of psychology at Boston University, said the research may raise ethical concerns about turning animals into robots.
The potential of using such implanted electrodes to control humans was investigated by a Tulane University researcher during the 1960s, with unclear results. That is something Chapin opposes so strongly he says it should be illegal.
So when things are possible without the complete advent of Nanotech, I would personally feel that It is not far before what you said and more than you said will be practical.
But you can yourself foresee the dangers of such a technology coming into our life,researchers are still facing lot of restrictions into research in such areas.
