4 ms·

Print These Electronic Circuits Directly onto Skin

50 points by headalgorithm 6y ago

ChuckMcM 6y ago
Pretty interesting stuff. Presumably one market here would be to hook people up to vital signs monitoring at a hospital without having all the wires going to the cart beside the bed. That would certainly be a win. I could also see wiring up an athlete in this way during training to improve their ability to target workout stress zones in real time.
NortySpock 6y ago
Reminds me of the "OC tattoos" (organic computing tattoos) of The Commonwealth Saga by Peter F. Hamilton; the tattooed-in hardware ran on-person secure electronic storage, cryptography keys, banking authentication software, and "electronic butler" systems (restricted artificial intelligence systems that acted as your virtual secretary).
- tenacious_tuna 6y ago
  Whenever we're able to compare imagined scifi things to "real" ones I always like seeing how close the scifi imaginer got. Hamilton's OC tattoos always seemed relatively rationally designed, with both a bent of aesthetic preference (with some people using the OC tattoos to effect butterfly wings around the eyes that change color, etc), but also functionality, with larger tattoos required for more speed/storage/etc. As we see these develop, I wonder how close (or far) the rest will turn out to be.
  - Fnoord 6y ago
    The night elves in the fantasy game World of Warcraft wear eye/face tattoos as well. I don't know, isn't it painful to get? Either way, I have fear of needles. I sure as hell won't get a tattoo. I'm still eagerly waiting for that device in Snow Crash which protects a woman against non-consensual intercourse. It was also a brilliant plot twist IMO.
cs702 6y ago
"Inevitable" -- would say every Sci-Fi author worth his or her salt. Of course human beings will get circuits printed or constructed directly onto their skin and other organic substrates in the future.
- hawkoy 6y ago
  Reminds me of the popularity of implants for insects around 2010. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Rp4V3Sj5jE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Rp4V3Sj5jE
- cinntaile 6y ago
  I do look forward to just waving my hand over a screen and having the data transferred to my tattoo. Or a tattoo that changes shape according to my heartbeat. This research seems like a nice baby step in the right direction.
  - Fnoord 6y ago
    A handful of people already put RFID chips into their skin a good 20 years ago. The problem with a tattoo is that it cannot easily change (unless henna), and its publicly available so it can be copied/mimicked (with e.g. henna but possibly other solutions). That makes it difficult to apply it for security reasons (CIA triangle). The same was true for RFID; can be easily copied. NFC is supposedly more secure, but nothing is 100% secure, so eventually you want a chip to be replaced. We have to ensure the hardware is replaceable.
nwatson 6y ago
QAnon/mark-of-the-beast folks will run hard with this one.
- wisdomdata 6y ago
  easy to imagine such a thing recording covid status being a pre-requisite to entering hospitals / government buildings. Other options would be offered initially.

50 points by headalgorithm 6y ago

Pretty interesting stuff. Presumably one market here would be to hook people up to vital signs monitoring at a hospital without having all the wires going to the cart beside the bed. That would certainly be a win. I could also see wiring up an athlete in this way during training to improve their ability to target workout stress zones in real time.

NortySpock 6y ago

Reminds me of the "OC tattoos" (organic computing tattoos) of The Commonwealth Saga by Peter F. Hamilton; the tattooed-in hardware ran on-person secure electronic storage, cryptography keys, banking authentication software, and "electronic butler" systems (restricted artificial intelligence systems that acted as your virtual secretary).

tenacious_tuna 6y ago
Whenever we're able to compare imagined scifi things to "real" ones I always like seeing how close the scifi imaginer got. Hamilton's OC tattoos always seemed relatively rationally designed, with both a bent of aesthetic preference (with some people using the OC tattoos to effect butterfly wings around the eyes that change color, etc), but also functionality, with larger tattoos required for more speed/storage/etc. As we see these develop, I wonder how close (or far) the rest will turn out to be.
- Fnoord 6y ago
  The night elves in the fantasy game World of Warcraft wear eye/face tattoos as well. I don't know, isn't it painful to get? Either way, I have fear of needles. I sure as hell won't get a tattoo. I'm still eagerly waiting for that device in Snow Crash which protects a woman against non-consensual intercourse. It was also a brilliant plot twist IMO.

cs702 6y ago

"Inevitable" -- would say every Sci-Fi author worth his or her salt. Of course human beings will get circuits printed or constructed directly onto their skin and other organic substrates in the future.

hawkoy 6y ago
Reminds me of the popularity of implants for insects around 2010. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Rp4V3Sj5jE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Rp4V3Sj5jE
cinntaile 6y ago
I do look forward to just waving my hand over a screen and having the data transferred to my tattoo. Or a tattoo that changes shape according to my heartbeat. This research seems like a nice baby step in the right direction.
- Fnoord 6y ago
  A handful of people already put RFID chips into their skin a good 20 years ago. The problem with a tattoo is that it cannot easily change (unless henna), and its publicly available so it can be copied/mimicked (with e.g. henna but possibly other solutions). That makes it difficult to apply it for security reasons (CIA triangle). The same was true for RFID; can be easily copied. NFC is supposedly more secure, but nothing is 100% secure, so eventually you want a chip to be replaced. We have to ensure the hardware is replaceable.

nwatson 6y ago

QAnon/mark-of-the-beast folks will run hard with this one.

wisdomdata 6y ago
easy to imagine such a thing recording covid status being a pre-requisite to entering hospitals / government buildings. Other options would be offered initially.