Wow! A chemical that can turn you transparent...

A chemical that can turn your
organs transparent

Seriously.. wow. The Japanese never cease to amaze me!

Who needs an invisibility cloak when you can be transparent? Researchers in Japan recently developed a chemical
reagent that turns biological tissue
transparent, opening doors to optical
imaging techniques and avenues of
research that scientists have long only
dreamed of. And speaking of dreaming
— if you're going to start turning body
parts transparent, where better to start
than the brain?

What if you could dissect an organism
without so much as picking up a
scalpel? For years, researchers have
used animals like zebrafish — which
are naturally transparent at the
embryological stage of development,
and were recently genetically
engineered to remain transparent
through adulthood — to do just that.
But for other model organisms, like
mice and rats, scientists have always
had to get at their insides the old
fashioned way: by cutting them up.

It sounds dodgy to me and I personally wouldn't do anything like that to my body unless it was to save my immediate life. Imagine how wild this could get in the future!

With Nano technology and Trans-Humanism breaking through I can only dream of the possibilities! Maybe one day soon soldiers will take an injection and turn invisible.. this idea is not as far fetched as it sounds.

The researchers' findings, which are
documented in the latest issue of
Nature Neuroscience, demonstrate their
ability to visualize in three dimensions
the intricate networks of neurons and
blood vessels in the brains of
embryonic mice at sub-cellular
resolution, like the neural stem cells
(green) and blood vessels (red) pictured
here.

This latest research uses Scale to visualize fluorescently-labeled brain samples, but the researchers say that
their reagent will prove invaluable in
the study of other tissues, as well. Dr.
Atsushi Miyawaki, who led the RIKEN
research team, says they envision using
Scal e on organs like the heart, muscles,
and kidneys, and even on tissues from
other organisms, including primates
and humans.

This is incredible to me anyway I don't know about you guys. I envision super soldiers and police in the future like Robocop and Terminator..

Obviously the whole supercop thing is scary as cops already abuse their powers enough as it is.

All the stuff I used to dream about when I was little.. I never knew it would all come about so fast! We do live in an amazingly awesome phase of Human history. I don't know about you, but even during all this downright craziness, violence, confusion and deception, I still feel blessed and extremely lucky to be here!

The full article is here along with a cool picture of this in action.

It would absolutely revolutionize autopsies and forensics of all kinds, it would seem to me...

I'll take a number wayyyy at the back to the line for having it done to me though. I saw the movie and it didn't seem to turn out well. The uses....as much as the plot. lol.. Yeah, peeping toms would have a whole new definition and recon by fire, a WHOLE new meaning.

reply to post by Wrabbit2000

I agree wholeheartedly, I would definitely not want to do this to myself but I know that if there was something like this on the consumer market many people would.

The field of espionage may have a new game changer soon! Invisible spies.. We are already well on the way to sub atomic particle matter rearranging tech and now invisibility cloaks are becoming viable?

Lol, did I wake up in a Harry Potter book or something? I'm only 20 years old. Technology is getting almost god like.

Well, it's getting to be like they're preparing the public for something.... Aside from being really amazing in it's own right of course, I got to thinking. This is the 3rd actual working prototype technology shown to the public for invisibility or cloaking since last fall.

The first was the BAE cloaking skin or whatever the secret sauce is to make a tank vanish on I.R. and then reappear like a Volkswagon Beetle or something.

Then the thin sheet of nano-tech that goes from solid to invisible with current applied and presented as a future basis for possible cloaking tech.

Now we see the biological solution to the same problem. It's just interesting how these things come in clusters, if it's coincidental. A couple, in combination.....actually would ..well, nvm. Thats crazy.

I bet it is highly carcinogenic.

Something this awesome has to have a downside.

Originally posted by Mkoll
I bet it is highly carcinogenic.

Something this awesome has to have a downside.

The article actually says it cannot be used on living tissue. Yet.

I think the more likely medical use will be to eventually have genetics in newborns changed to be more compatible with new tech like this. If used properly, I imagine this will someday be safer than x-rays.

Originally posted by TechUnique

All the stuff I used to dream about when I was little.. I never knew it would all come about so fast! We do live in an amazingly awesome phase of Human history. I don't know about you, but even during all this downright craziness, violence, confusion and deception, I still feel blessed and extremely lucky to be here!

Man you ain't lying, the future is now. Hopefully humanity as a whole will get to enjoy some of these amazing technologies being (developed? finally released?) rather than simply reaping the fruits of oppression.

I feel like you that every awesome technology from the cartoons and such of our childhood are becoming reality right now. I've read that the tech that our government possesses is 25 to 50 years more advanced then what the public is aware of, makes me wonder if we were slowly being acclimated to it through media to prepare us for the marvels to come. Invisibility cloaks, laser weapons, holograms, artificial intelligence, cyborgs/transhumans, robotic limbs for amputees, even robots themselves are all becoming part of the real world. Very interesting times to live in.

I just hope Pandora's Box isn't cracked completely open before we even realize what we're doing. Thanks for sharing the article!!

Every woman not wearing synthetic fiber is now at risk. I can see it now.

RE: turning living biological tissue transparent....it is something I would be skeptical of. The applications certainly would be dodgy for military use (cloaking is still the best option there). But it could lead to a revolution in biological sciences.

To be honest, I am of the position that the great untapped technology is biology. We have been kidding ourselves thinking that we could do it better. Look at the information storage in DNA. We can't touch that right now. Anyway, tangent aside, I would expect a growth in the biosciences as a result of this.

What is it they do to some fish in pet stores? I don't think it was the Zebra fish but I could be wrong. I believe PetSmart was refusing to sell them a few years ago, something about cruelty to animals.....never mind the fact they sell animals captured from their original habitat . Something they were injected with, they were transparent but not invisible. I tried to look it up but haven't found anything so far. That was live tissue affected by a certain chemical so I guess I don't get it.

reply to post by TechUnique


I wonder how long the transparency would last. The article didn't see anything about reversing it. It would be great to be able to use this to make a diagnosis without surgery but I doubt that anybody would want to be transparent forever, lol.

reply to post by Gridrebel


Is this the one?



Click it to make the pic larger. It's HUUUGE so I had to use the thumbnail.

I believe this is a painted indian glass fish, or something similar to that.

Obviously, military applications first.

Instead of putting on a 5 million dollar optical cloak that does a shoddy job of turning you invisible, just take a pill and within half an hour, you're the new Predator.

Sometimes, the power we achieve is just too much for such a destructive species. Wait and see what they do with it. *shakes head slowly*