Researchers from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore have learned to control groups of Madagascar cockroaches using electrical stimulation.
Each of them was equipped with a “backpack” with a battery, a computer and an antenna, as well as electrodes that were embedded in the bases of the antennae that help the insects navigate. When the cockroaches encounter obstacles with their antennae, they turn. By stimulating these organs with electrical impulses, the “backpack” can direct the cockroach in the right direction.
Scientists have developed an algorithm to control not one cockroach, but a whole swarm. It appoints one or more leaders who go to a point specified by a person, and the rest follow them.
Inquisitive minds of scientists and good funding – a terrible mixture )))
https://arxiv.org/abs/2403.17392
