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Optical tracking and laser-induced mortality of insects during flight
- chinathrow 6y agoThe 4 videos at the end of the article at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-71824-y#Sec18 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-71824-y#Sec18 spark joy - these beasts are somehow attracted to my scent/blood so I allways get the bites while others are spared.
- jcims 6y agoIs your blood type o-negative? Any time mosquitos are out i get bit more than anyone else by a margin.
- trhway 6y agosame here. I wonder whether it is related that the O-negative is universal donor - i.e. it has lowest chance of causing immune reaction by not having all those antigens/factors, and thus i'd speculate lowest chance of "indigestion" in mosquito :) Wrt. the original post - if we put "mortality inducing" laser on a drone so it would collect the "fried" insects sparrow style then we'd have a nice protein rich dinner after half-an-hour of the drone flying around. Turning the tables so to speak.
- monoideism 6y agoIt's the blood group O that draws mosquitos, not a positive or negative rhesus factor: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15311477/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15311477/ I'm O-positive and am always the center of their attention. It's amazing, sometimes people don't even believe me when I tell them how often I'm being bit (because they're getting nothing).
- jcims 6y agoInteresting. I just heard something about that in passing and it made sense. My father in law is type AB (and a lifelong smoker) and mosquitos completely ignore him. I'll have ten bites and they don't even get in his vicinity..
- dylan604 6y agoYour contribution to humanity is appreciated by the rest of us being sparred the bastards going after you. Fight well my friend!
- hyperion2010 6y agoSolid work, but I find it quite concerning that there appears to be no discussion of potential false positive detections of other species beyond those specifically targeted. The research is still in a very early phase, and `wing-beat frequency, and/or other factors` means they are thinking about it a bit. If I deploy one of these I want to know how many friendly or benign insects I'm going to be killing.
- TooSmugToFail 6y agoThey are not "thinking about it a bit", their earlier work was concerned with precisely identifying the species and gender of the mosquito. I believe this system can very accurately ID and neutralize an exact specie of a mosquito.
- CookieMon 6y agoyeah, from 10 years ago: > The laser detection is so precise that it can specify the species, and even the gender, of the mosquito being targeted. “The women are bigger. They beat at a lower frequencies,” Mr. Myhrvold said. Since it is only the female mosquitoes who bite humans, for the sake of efficiency, his system would leave the males alone. -- https://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/12/using-lasers-to-zap-mosquitoes/ https://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/12/using-lasers-to-za...
- rossdavidh 6y agoTrue that, but if a system of this sort is not used, I think in reality it would not be the case that nothing would be used, but rather that very broad-spectrum insecticides get used. That's what happens now. So even a somewhat-targeted method would be a big improvement over what happens now.
- tda 6y agoAnyone else chuckle at the term "laser-induced mortality"?
- dylan604 6y agoI wonder how the SDI guys used to refer to targets getting taken out by lasers. Oh wait, they didn't have to worry about it as it never worked!
- narrator 6y agoDefense Secretary Espers gave a speech a few weeks ago where he said China and Russia had directed energy weapons on satellites. This was largely ignored with all the other shit going on.
- dylan604 6y agoSatellites are easy. They're just sitting ducks. ICBM re-entry vehicles are much tougher.
- yencabulator 6y agoAnd more likely to have an ablative heat shield on the side pointing at you. Adding a little heat to a thing already being heated a lot by the atmosphere isn't as effective as blinding a spy telescope aimed at you.
- Camillo 6y agoGood to hear America has espers, though. As shown in Akira, espers beat directed energy weapons on satellites.
- Nextgrid 6y agoLaser-induced rapid scheduled disassembly.
- Cerium 6y ago
- jmercouris 6y agoCareful, mosquitos will evolve to be reflective if we deploy enough of these :-D
- other_herbert 6y agoOnly if we wound and not kill
- monoideism 6y agoNo. The very killing applies selective pressure.
- justinclift 6y ago"Transparent enough to not be detected by these systems" is probably more likely. ;)
- chaganated 6y agoInteresting subject, but the experiment is a rube-goldberg mess--a cartesian product of frequencies, intensities, durations, and a rather complex targeting system. Not looking forward to the same kind of rig being attached to high-power lasers, and pointed at civilians.
- rossdavidh 6y agoNot that I think there aren't governments and other organizations willing to do that, but it has been proven time and again that chemical explosives (e.g. gunpowder) is just hard to beat for killing efficiency. In other words, anyone willing to do that, would probably be willing to just shoot them with a bullet or drop a bomb on them, and that would always be cheaper.
- chaganated 6y agoexplosives don't really jive with the social credit system's API
- scrose 6y ago> Not looking forward to the same kind of rig being attached to high-power lasers, and pointed at civilians. Already happening: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_Denial_System https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_Denial_System
- jcims 6y agoSame folks from 10 years ago - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKm8FolQ7jw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKm8FolQ7jw
- myself248 6y agoAnd the reason they didn't open-source it and save a billion people right then, is they were gonna patent it all up and commercialize it. But I still can't buy one. What the hell, capitalism?
- jcims 6y agoProbably something to do with the liability of autonomous targeting and firing of high power laser pulses outside.
- throwaway316943 6y agoSo release it in the public domain and let someone in Africa make the choice between a small chance of minor vision damage vs crippling and possibly fatal malaria
- jcims 6y agoThis is still going to require some reasonably high power laser diodes, precision galvanometers, optics, etc. Probably $2k each to cover a very small area. They just aren't going to be that practical. Genetically modified mosquitos are the way to actually solve the problem, but that has its own risks.
- hutzlibu 6y ago"Genetically modified mosquitos are the way" So you think a massive invasive change in the core biology of a very large animal population is clearly superior to a local solution? Ok, then please explain why. Personally I would much rather leave the wildlife genetics as it is and rather protect homes directly. (btw. mosquitos are annoying even if they do not carry malaria)
- sleavey 6y ago"the visible wavelengths required significantly lower laser exposure than near infrared wavelengths to disable subjects, though near infrared sources remain attractive given their cost and retina safety" The paper repeatedly claims near infrared laser light to be "retina safe" (quotes theirs) which is an oversimplification. Infrared light of wavelength around 1 µm in sufficient powers is very dangerous for the retina, especially compared to visible light where the blink reflex can save damage by lasers up to a point. Telecom wavelengths around 1.5 µm happen to be safer because such light gets absorbed in the cornea before being focused onto the retina, but at sufficient powers or longer wavelengths (e.g. 3 µm) where the absorption depth in the cornea gets very short there can instead be damage to that part of the eye. It's always the combination of the wavelength, which determines the absorptivity in the different parts of the eye, and incident energy (pulse duration × power), that determines the safety; there are no innately safe wavelengths close to that part of the spectrum.
- tachyonbeam 6y agoMaybe the best would be to mix a weak visible laser with a more powerful near-infrared laser, so that you make people blink, and your more powerful laser is less harmful? You could even trigger the visible "warning" laser 5-20ms before you fire the killer laser.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- ncmncm 6y agoBlink reflex time is quite a lot longer than 25ms.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- analog31 6y agoSome powerful laboratory IR lasers come with a built-in visible tracer laser. Mainly, it's useful for aligning all of the optics. With the IR laser enabled, I'm still wearing my safety goggles.
- sradman 6y agoMachine vision system that detects insects and targets them with a retina safe laser, however: > For both the coarse and fine tracking systems, subjects are identified by the size of their silhouettes generated from near infrared LED back-illumination or reflection. Very impressive system but it currently requires a uniform backlight.
- lbj 6y agoIf memory serves me well, 6 or 7 years ago a former microsoft employee made such a device. It ran on solar power and had just enough power to melt the wings of mosquitoes. I wanted to buy it ever since I saw the prototype, but I dont think it was ever released.
- apendleton 6y agoThese are the same people. Nathan Myhrvold is who you're thinking of -- he was the former CTO of Microsoft, and among other things, now runs an outfit called Intellectual Ventures, who did both that work several years ago and is responsible for this paper (I wasn't sure at first, but there are references to Intellectual Ventures Labs further down into the paper). IV is either a research institution of a patent troll or both, depending on your perspective, but either way, they don't generally commercialize the ideas they come up with, they just license them.
- wussboy 6y agoSo this invention which could remove a significant portion of human suffering is being squatted on? And because it is patented no one else can remove this suffering either?
- 95014_refugee 6y agoNot necessarily, or yet, but it would certainly fit IV's MO if it were.
- silexia 6y agoWhat a nightmare. The patent system is enormously harmful to the world and should be done away with.
- mensetmanusman 6y agoDepends on whether you think people would work nights and weekends to get an idea out the door if someone with more money can immediately copy and profit. History says no, but maybe there is a different system.
- zarkov99 6y agoGod bless scientists. We might not have flying cars yet but this is almost as good.
- seg_lol 6y agoAwesome stuff. I'd like to see entirely non-chemical pest control for agriculture.
- mrfusion 6y agoIn theory you could use a lower powered beam to cause the insect to turn around and stay out of certain areas. Or use microwaves instead.
- NickBusey 6y agoI work near a restaurant kitchen, and they spend much of the day with a flyswatter in hand getting rid of these pests. I have actually verbalized this idea to the chefs in the past, I'm glad to see it actually being done. If made cheap enough this could be a real solution to keeping bugs away without resorting to nasty chemicals or netting everywhere. This has the potential to be a big win for not only comfort, but health and safety as well. Less bugs in kitchens = less chance for food getting infected or worse yet, having eggs laid in it.
- p1mrx 6y agoWhat's the point in verbalizing your laser flyswatter idea to chefs, when even most engineers wouldn't be able to build one?
- count 6y ago"Dude, it would so awesome if they like, built a laser torrent to shoot down these things" "Yeah, that would be sweet" "Yeah" Because it's a neat sci-fi idea and you're talking to a colleague...
- chrisseaton 6y agoWhy are they infested with flies? If you're having to swat them you're already doing something wrong.
- ncmncm 6y agoI am told that bead curtains in doorways keep out (or keep in) flies. It seems surprising, but they are very heavily used in some places, so there might be reasons to believe it. I wonder what the mechanism is. Do the beads need to be transparent?
- nextos 6y agoI've seen this in the Mediterranean quite a lot. Particularly in Spain. Beads do not need to be transparent, and it works well.
- ww520 6y agoThere were more than one occasion when I hunt for the mosquito sneaked in the bedroom that I had thoughts of building a laser gun to zap the sucker.
- ncmncm 6y agoThey don't seem to know that there is a specific optical wavelength that dissociates chitin via a mechanism not dependent on heating. It seems like much shorter or less focused exposures should suffice at such a wavelength. In particular, a mosquito whose wings are shredded does not need to be (also) killed to be eliminated as a threat to public health.
- mhb 6y agoSalt-induced mortality of flying insects: https://www.bugasalt.com/ https://www.bugasalt.com/
- spiritplumber 6y agoInfrared lasers are NOT retina-safe.
- mensetmanusman 6y agoare not _necessarily_ retina-safe.
- mensetmanusman 6y agoThis needs to exist. Mosquitoes apparently have accounted for half of all human deaths ever. https://www.nature.com/news/2002/021001/full/news021001-6.html https://www.nature.com/news/2002/021001/full/news021001-6.ht...
- nanomonkey 6y agoThis is straight out of Cory Doctorow's book 'Pirate Cinema', can't wait until hats with these become commodities and I can repurpose them to knock out CCD security cameras!
- yboris 6y agoThis was presented at a TED talk 10 years ago (2010) https://www.ted.com/talks/nathan_myhrvold_could_this_laser_zap_malaria?language=en https://www.ted.com/talks/nathan_myhrvold_could_this_laser_z... What's different now?
- pontus 6y agoHow is this different from this project from 2011? https://magazine.columbia.edu/article/what-bugs-mosquitoes https://magazine.columbia.edu/article/what-bugs-mosquitoes
- pontus 6y ago"Szabolcs Marka, an associate professor of physics, is developing a novel way to protect people from the vectors: a virtual mosquito net with infrared light vibrating at wavelengths that irritate the insects’ nervous systems."
- scottlamb 6y agoReminds me of the Africanized bee zapper from David Brin's Earth: http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/content.asp?Bnum=1790 http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/content.asp?Bnum=1790 Looks like this particular paper is focused on the laser part. I wonder how well the tracking part of it can work—if the bee zapper is practical.
- aaron695 6y agoI used to admire Nathan Myhrvold for his work on the Modernist Cuisine and this, until someone cut him down in a HN comment that just because he plays with lasers and mosquito's in a lab and makes cookbooks it doesn't excuse his patent trolling and damage to the world. And to be honest the Modernist Cuisine isn't as good as the hype I've since decided after actually reading it. Anywho if this ever leaves a lab I might re-evaluate my opinion on him.
- MatthewElvey 6y agoKudos to Intellectual Ventures Laboratory, Nathan Mhyrvold, Matthew D. Keller, Bryan J. Norton, David J. Farrar, Phil Rutschman, Maclen Marvit & Arty Makagon! I look forward to deploying this tech to deal with fruit flies soonish. I don’t even need to do a back of the envelope calculation to have confidence this is soon to be a viable first world niche product. I think it’s likely viable at a massive scale (many millions of units) too.
- leghifla 6y agoIt seems really interesting at first glance, but having worked with high-speed cameras, filming a mosquito at 30m at 2000fps will only be practical in a bright sunny day. Some clouds or at night and you will need kW's of light just for tracking the mosquito. So the emphasis on power budget for the laser seems pointless to me.
- whiw 6y agoGod here. So species 1 (in this case, mosquitos) is annoying species 2 (in this case homosapiens). I'm rather disappointed to know that species 2 has taken it upon themselves to maim species 1 by burning them. I may need to do something about this.