Bio-Drone, Grows, Flies, Then Dissolves When Done.

Tastes great with butter and garlic

A fine fungal morning to you Above Top Secretions,

Flying magical mushroom drones?
Im having a Mario Brothers flashback.

Ok. So apparently, mushroom+motor+magic= disposable fungo drone

A team of researchers participating in the International Genetically Engineered Machine competition (iGEM) — an event focused on synthetic biology — submitted a novel drone that can self-assemble anywhere to do its job and then melt into a harmless puddle of sugar, if it gets lost.

The team, captained by Raman Nelakanti, a bioengineering student from Stanford University, and consisting of undergrads from Stanford, Brown University and Spelman College, were given the same kit of biological parts that every team was given. Over the summer of 2014, they used those parts as well as parts of their own design to develop a biodegradable drone.

They built the hull of the drone from cellulose and mycelium, the vegetative part of a mushroom and coated it with the protein that wasps use to make their nests waterproof.

“Mushroom materials are inherently lightweight, biodegradable and the strength to weight ratio of the material was preferable for this application,” Ecovative’s Melissa Jacobsen told FastCoExist. Ecovative is the materials science company that provided the iGem team with the mushroom-based components.

Whoa! Always amazing the things those of genius can conceive of, an Eco-friendly spy/possibly killing machine.

a reply to: dashen

I don't think it's a viable or sensible idea - the fact is that drones are valuable pieces of equipment, the motors and electronics are probably the most valuable components on board and they are probably the most harmful to the environment too. As the shell degrades quickly the electronics are exposed faster and are more likely to harm the environment.

As well as these obvious problems it would seem that this material is harder to repair than other options and is going to need replacing on a more regular basis.

It is much more viable to have a strong and light shell and fit a crash alarm so the drone can be located by sound or a locator device of some sort so that it can be tracked.

I can see where they are coming from - using it where it won't return but that's all that they'd be useful for.

a reply to: dashen

Well that's re-assuring

That's a really amazing invention. Without the details of how the drone builds itself or how the system works I'm sorta left to imagine. I guess some sort of nanotube technology is involved or some other related mini-tech. The part where they say it can grow itself from simple ingredients is really awesome. The article doesn't give the drone dimensions or include a video of the growth in action. Congrats to the team! They should win.


a reply to: dashen