14 DAY TRIAL // Although it may sound unbelievable, many scientific achievements take place behind closed doors and beyond the knowledge of the public. Such is the case with the work of University of Reading experts Kevin Warwick and Ben Whalley, from the UK, who are currently conducting experiments on controlling robots with clusters of rat neurons. They even managed to create such a biomechanical device, which was able to maneuver around a small obstacle. They plan to use human nerve cells next.
Their robot benefits from the electrical firings of more than 300,000 rat neurons, all grown in a nutrient “soup” and connected to the machine's distance sensors output. In a video that has been made available, it is shown how the neurons have the ability to steer the robot inside a small enclosure. In spite of this major accomplishment, the goal of the team is not to further the field of robotics per se, but rather to gain new insight into how neurons react to external stimuli, NewScientist reports.
That is to say, they plan to use this artificial setting to study diseases such as epilepsy, which are believed to be caused by activity spikes in neurons, when many of them fire together – a process known among experts as “bursting.” The team will try to apply various types of electrical, physical and chemical alterations to the system, and assess how the neurons shift their functions and electrical behavior. This line of investigation could result in new therapies for the condition, and others like it, if a human equivalent is found.
When the ongoing experiments stop, the team plans to use a large cluster of human neurons to operate the robot. The goal is to compare how this type of nerve cells behaves in reference to that found in rats. “We'll be trying to find out if the learning aspects and memory appear to be similar,” Warwick says. There is no timeline for when these experiments will begin, because the supply of neurons is readily available, and there is no shortage of the cells. In addition, the ethical aspects of the trade have already been discussed with the company sourcing the neurons.