Have you ever wanted to have the power of healing yourself like the heroes in the comic books? Well, that might be a possibility in the near future. There is a new research program out that has dedicated itself to figure out if a chip implanted inside of the human body would allow it’s inhabitant to tackle any infections or injured organs at rapid speeds.
How this would happen is the tiny chip would send electrical pulses through it’s inhabitant’s body; doing this allows the chip to gather information on the condition of your organs and send the necessary stimuli to help combat the infection/injury.
The idea for the technology is based on a biological process known as neuromodulation, in which the peripheral nervous system (the nerves that connect every other part of the body to the brain and spinal cord) monitors the status of internal organs and regulate the body’s responses to infection and disease. When a person is sick or injured, this natural process can sometimes be thrown off, according to DARPA. Instead of making a person feel better, neuromodulation can actually exacerbate a condition, causing pain, inflammation and a weakened immune system (Tiny Implants Could Give Humans Self-Healing Superpowers).
Now you may be thinking, “Hey, don’t they have devices that are very similar to this already available?” And the answer to your question is yes. However, the neat thing about this device is that it is very small and can be implanted with just a needle. It’s quite a revolutionary design because that enables it to be placed “exactly where it is needed at the nerve endings” (Tiny Implants Could Give Humans Self-Healing Superpowers).
I think this is a very interesting idea as well as it is a revolutionary one. It baffles my mind thinking about the actual size of the device and then comparing that to it’s task. It seems unimaginable. Granted, the device hasn’t actually been made yet but the fact that we believe it’s possible is still pretty exciting. It makes me think about all of the innovative technological devices that are yet to come. If we could create something that helps heal our bodies, perhaps we could create something that adds years onto our lives, or prevents us from dying for a while. Heck, if we can create devices that can conquer death, maybe a time machine isn’t out of the question either.
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This also reminded me about the real life iron man. Technology is creating some amazing imaginative ideas. This idea can be much more beneficial to society as it can battle infections. That being said i just don’t see this happening any time soon. To much funding and who even knows how we would use it?
In response to the post itself, wow I never heard about this. This is an intriguing topic. The development of technology is so vast it is unbelievable. When I was younger and uses to see technology advances like stuff like this on cartoons and would ask my parents was it real they would tell me no. However, today watching movies where people can climb buildings with suction cups, x-ray vison glasses, and small unnoticeable cameras all seem likely to be true.
I do not really know how I feel about them implanting something into your brain. I say this because there is so many things that can go wrong. Your brain is one of the most important organs in your body and if your brain goes dead then so does the rest of you major organs. On the contrary, it may be safer than PED’s because those drugs over time can have devastating effects and sports players have openly come out about their peoples of dealing with PED’s and other drugs giving to them during the course of their career. I believe that it could break barriers that with administrating the technology to those who are paraplegic. I believe if we have technology can help your brain enhance its physical abilities than we may be close to the break of having technology that can tell our brain how to fight off cancer cells. I also believe this is leading to manmade evolution. Maybe this is not something that we should mess around with by offering it to the general public. There is an old saying:
“One man’s tool is another man’s weapon”
I think we should all think about what this saying actually means and how it relates to this post.
In response to the comment above, Katelyn I think they are not using this technology yet because its probably still in trail run. Another reason is because its most likely too expensive right now to bring to the consumer market. I would put it on the same scale as most of the higher costing cosmetic surgery. Insurance would not cover the costs of it so just think about it who would actually have enough money to receive the technology, people who have a lot of money who when they take it will enhance their abilities so they would make even more money. With that being said sports players comes to mind. That takes it to a whole different topic of controversy on whether or not what PED’s or performing enhancing drugs are fair in sports.
Moreover, I would like to say that this technology most likely will start off being giving to people in the military which I wouldn’t be surprised if they haven’t already began to do so. I came to this conclusion because lots of present technologies have started off as past weapons for an example, sonar and radar which are now included in all commercial ships use to only be equipped in navy ships during WWII to detect the Japanese U-boats underwater to defend against surprise attacks and to hunt them down.
This is such an interesting idea. A similar invention to this one is called a pacemaker. Now, it does’t do any miraculous healing, or battle infections, however, it helps the heart beat at a safe rhythm. I don’t think that such a chip could be invented to solve an infection. Also, even if it were to successfully be invented, who would it be provided to? Would it be the sick? The rich? Or a cheap implant that all the population could afford?
If they already have this technology, why aren’t we using it? It seems like we’ve come so far with scientific advancements but we have only put so many in to practice. Could this mean a longer human life span? Or a superhuman race in the future? I agree that it seems almost too much like a movie to be true, but it makes me curious about the implications it may have in the future.