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http://www.bradenton.com/mld/bradenton/news/local/14402303.htm

 

Warriors of the future will "taste" battlefield

 

 

tongue.jpg

 

PENSACOLA, Fla. - Military researchers believe the tongue could be key in their quest to create the super warrior of the future, giving soldiers sensory powers similar to owls, snakes and fish.

Army Rangers with 360-degree unobstructed night vision, Navy SEALs sensing sonar in their heads while maintaining normal vision underwater - scientists at the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition are turning sci-fi into reality.

By routing signals from helmet-mounted cameras, sonar and other equipment through the tongue to the brain, they hope to give elite soldiers superhuman senses.

The question is that while animals' brains can process the extra stimuli, it is unknown whether human brains can adapt, said institute head Ken Ford. His facility specializes in "human-centered computing," fitting technology to people to make machines more user-friendly.

"Pit vipers, that's one reason they are so dangerous. They have heat detectors, infrared as well as natural vision," he said. "We know brains can do this."

Dr. Anil Raj, the project's lead scientist, envisions Navy SEALs incorporating sonar into their senses much like dolphins or whales.

The research is designed to create superior troops, but Ford said the same technology could restore sight or hearing to soldiers wounded in war.

The device, known as "Brain Port," was pioneered more than 30 years ago by Dr. Paul Bach-y-Rita, a University of Wisconsin neuroscientist. Bach-y-Rita began routing images from a camera through electrodes taped to people's backs and later discovered the tongue a superior transmitter.

In testing, blind people found doorways, noticed people walking in front of them and caught balls. A version of the device, expected to be commercially marketed soon, has restored balance to those whose vestibular systems in the inner ear were destroyed by antibiotics.

The Florida institute is the first to research military uses of sensory augmentation.

Raj began his research using Navy divers for one simple reason - "These guys don't think anything about sticking something in their mouths to do their jobs."

A narrow strip of red plastic connects from the Brain Port to the tongue where 144 microelectrodes transmit information through nerve fibers to the brain. Instead of holding and looking at compasses and bluky-hand-held sonar devices, the divers can processes the information through their tongues, Raj said.

Michael Zinszer, a veteran Navy diver and director of Florida State University's Underwater Crime Scene Investigation School, took part in testing using the tongue to transmit an electronic compass and an electronic depth sensor.

He likened the feeling on his tongue to Pop Rocks candies.

"You are feeling the outline of this image," he said. "I was in the pool, they were directing me to a very small object and I was able to locate everything very easily."

Underwater crime scene investigators might use the device to identify search patterns, signal each other and "see through our tongues, as odd as that sounds," Zinszer said.

Raj said the objective for military usage is to keep Navy divers' hands and eyes free.

"It will free up their eyes to do what those guys really want to, which is to look for those mines and see shapes that are coming out of the murk."

Sonar is the next step. A lot depends on technological developments to make sonar smaller - hand-held sonar is currently about the size of a lunch box.

"If they could get it small enough, it could be mounted on a helmet, then they could pan around on their heads and they could feel the sonar on their tongues with good registration to what they are seeing visually," Raj said.

Raj and his research assistants spend hours at the University of West Florida's athletic complex testing the equipment at an indoor pool, where the trio frequently attract attention from onlookers curious about the computers, wires and underwater radio, which can be heard throughout the Olympic-size pool. Raj does the diving himself.

They plan to officially demonstrate the system to Navy and Marine Corps divers in May. If the military screeners like what they see, it could be put on a "rapid response" to quickly get in the hands of military users within the next three to six months.

The research is being funded by through the Department of Defenses' Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. The exact amount of the expenditure is unavailable.

Work on the infrared-tongue vision for Army Rangers isn't as far along. But Raj said the potential usefulness of the night vision technology is tremendous. It would allow soldiers to work in the dark without cumbersome night-vision goggles and to "see out the back of their heads," he said.

Understanding how the Brain Port works has to do with "sensory fusion," Raj said, picking up a pair of scissors he uses to cut tape to secure a piece of diving equipment before he plops in the pool for another test.

"There's a lot going on when I'm holding these scissors. I'm using them, I'm looking at them, I'm talking about them. Think if I had to have all that information displayed on a screen in front of me instead of just doing the task. The brain is doing the fusion here," he said.

"If we put sonar into the head, you would know instinctively 'I should be looking over here because something is coming out of the murk'."

He returns to the pit viper as an example of how, ideally, such a system should work.

"The snake just knows where the heat blobs are relative to its head," he said.

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I thought this was about a taking heads song.

 

the outcome to this can only be bad.

dont these scientists ever watch movies or read books?

i read something about scientists that grew up in the 60's and 70's

who watched star trek, etc. being influenced with current machine

designs. phasers, cell phones, etc are all products of such minds.

 

we've also got transporter technology on the rise. currently it's only particles.

 

google oner whored itself out with crafts. what stupid bot tech is running that

shit?

 

ever look in your gmail inbox? i got a letter from a girl about how much

she hates me now and google offered divorce attorney services, 1-800-flowers links, and

some other crap...

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most shits that can be imagined can/will also be invented.

 

even more likely as they are ni tonly imagined but written about and shown on tv en masse.

 

 

 

flush that weaponry shit and all the rest.

think of how cool this will be for good services. sucks that darpa

does shit for evil purposes.

 

darpa is the devil

 

heard about the darpa contest to develop free roaming unmanned street robots?

colleges everywhere are entering. fun fun fun.

 

we don't live in a police state......yet.

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Almost all crazy tech breakthroughs happen for military purposes.

 

And pretty much all of them eventually trickle down to the consumer. Chill out.

 

 

no way. it's scary, but it's cool/scary. like "wow! we can do this?!?!"

and "wow. this is going to be the beginning of the end"

 

seen those bad ass chameleone uniforms for soldiers?

 

http://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/issues/2001/Jul/Futuristic_Soldier.htm

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the title has too many overtones. twink.

 

i actually had to look up what a 'twink' is. apparently, it's derogatory

homo slang. haha.

 

what if i was referring to cunnilingus? what if i was referring to that cee-lo

goodie (etc) song? what if cee-lo was referring to cunnilingus?

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Now is the time to get on, like Spike Lee said, "Get on thebus"

Go get your work and keep your beeper chirping is a must

Is you on the that dust or cornstarch familiar with that smackman

The music is like that green stuff provided to you by sack man

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Guest spectr

ha i read about this shit a while ago man.

just look out for soldiers in 20 yrs licking everything from fucked up side effects.

once they build a 50ft mech suit i'm down though until then the miltarys inventons suck.

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