‘Intelligent’ prostheses function better than normal body parts and (below) a bee fitted with a radio transmitter

Technology springs surprises on us every now and then — inventions that may either gladden or shock us, but which irrevocably change our lives. The field of medicine, too, is changing dramatically.

This new branch of medical science, called “disruptive medicine”, is what many researchers thrive on. As Richard Satava, professor of surgery at Washington University Medical Center, Seattle, puts it: “We are at the end of the Information Age, and looking at the emergence of the Biointelligence Age.”

The Biointelligence Age features a slew of radical technologies that are set to change the entire way of treating health and disease issues. This includes the fusion of the living and non-living. Scientists have implanted sensors and radio transmitters in bees and cockroaches to control and monitor them. Guided with a joystick and with an implanted camera, the cockroach can be used in the detection of earthquakes and tsunamis. Similarly, bees fitted with sensors for biological weapons can transmit information to the military.

Brain implants are promising enormous hope for patients of paralysis, epilepsy and Parkinson’s disease. John Donoghue, a Californian neuro scientist, implants a device called “Braingate” in the heads of patients that allows them to mechanically move an attached robotic arm with the power of electrical impulses generated by thought. Fed by signals from the brain, the robot performs appropriate actions on behalf of the patient.

With the establishment of “intelligent” prostheses that function even better than normal body parts, and with all possible organs (except the brain) being replaceable with biosynthetic ones, it is possible to conceive of an “enhanced” man with 95 per cent of his body replaced by artificial ones.

So how realistic is it to expect intelligent machines to perform radical functions in place of diseased body parts? Says Ray Kurtzweil, an authority on science and futuristic technology, “The latest generation of the implant for Parkinson’s disease is more than an experiment; it is an FDA-approved therapy.” In Lisbon, Portugal, a group of blind people can see with the help of cameras that connect to electrodes implanted in the brain’s visual area.

Aubrey de Grey, a scientist at the Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, says, “We might be able to replace the hippocampus (memory centre of the brain) with a machine that could be used as a knowledge base, an in-built Internet. In the more distant future, we will probably understand the cerebral cortex well enough to start replacing parts of it too.”

Here’s more. American scientists have new insights into the phenomenon of hibernation, with stunning implications for medical care. Learning from the hibernation of the Arctic ground squirrel (in which a molecule acts on the hypothalamus of the brain to freeze all systems), scientists have been able to create a similar six-hour block in mice. In this state of suspended animation, the mice have no respiration, heart rate, blood pressure, ECG, EEG, and even no activity on functional MRI of the brain. After six hours, they are awakened and behave normally. Satava says, “While this is an early experiment, it points to the possibility of using these molecules or drugs for anaesthesia where a patient could be put to ‘sleep’ with no heart beat, no bleeding when incised, no pain or movement. When the surgery is over, he can be awakened.”

Scientist Eric Drexler confirms, “It is possible to discover a drug that causes biostasis (putting life in pause). Reversible biostasis could help astronauts in space get over boredom, cause anaesthesia in patients, and stabilise the patient’s system in ‘pause’ mode in a major emergency till hospitalised, like universal first-aid treatment.”

The era of transgenic animals (with genes transferred from another species) is upon us already. Michael Crichton’s latest book, Next, deals with apes that curse in Dutch and French, thanks to experiments in cross breeding with humans.

Satava cites the example of rhodopsins (colour detecting eye pigments). Man has four rhodopsins for vision of which he uses only two. The pit viper has one that is unused by humans, and which gives the snake the ability to seek its prey in infra red. Satava asks, “Should we genetically engineer our children to give them such abilities, so they can see in the dark?”

Troubling questions, these! The ethical issues of such research are being debated fiercely in scientific and political circles, with more questions than answers.