14 DAY TRIAL // As most people focus on renewable energy sources such as solar, wind or tidal power, some researchers seem to believe that these alternatives are so last year's.
Thus, they turned to generating energy by means of living organisms instead. Interestingly enough, their choice of guinea pig was your ordinary, not-even-remotely interesting snail.
Apparently, the sugar naturally produced by the snail's body is used by a small fuel cell (i.e. a device capable of converting chemical energy into electricity) to create energy.
Thus equipped, the snail proved to be most successful in generating energy on a regular basis for a period of time of several months, without showing any signs of discomfort or health issues.
The scientists involved in this project claim that such snails can be used to power things such as spy cameras, very small microphones and other pieces of electronics that don't require significant amounts of energy in order to function properly.
As cleantechies.com reports, their exact words were: “The snail with the implanted biofuel cell will be able to operate in a natural environment, producing sustainable electrical micropower for activating various bioelectronic devices.”
PETA supporters may be appalled to hear that this is not the first time that such an experiment is carried out. Thus, rumor has it that rats and rabbits were also used for similar purposes by what some may call “mad scientists,” yet this seems to be the first time that the experiment turned out to be successful without hurting the animal.
Now, there is no way of telling whether the snails were in fact unharmed, or if they simply couldn't find the means to express how much the fuel cell inserted in the bodies bothered them.
Yet it seems to us that both the time and the money invested in this experiment should have much better been spent planting trees or engaging in other similar activities, rather than toying with living creatures for no valid reasons.