#transanimalism

[alphadesigner]

Edgar the oak-deer is healing!

[beyondsingularity]

A neural implant gives rats the ability to detect infrared light -- part of the electromagnetic spectrum normally invisible to them.

The implant takes the form of an infrared detector on the rat's forehead which is wired to a set of microscopic electrodes in a region of the animal's brain normally associated with touch.

"The philosophy of the field of brain-machine interfaces has until now been to attempt to restore a motor function lost to lesion or damage of the central nervous system," said neurologist Eric Thomson, one of the authors of the study, in a press release. "This is the first paper in which a neuroprosthetic device was used to augment function -- literally enabling a normal animal to acquire a sixth sense." [...]

The study, published in the Nature Communications journal, also showed that, although the touch region of the brain adapted to allow the rats to process the infrared signals, the ability to sense touch was not impaired. That indicates that technologies to augment or restore senses in mammals could piggyback off related regions of the brain without damaging that area's original function.

beyondsingularity.com comment: So here ist the beginning of transanimalism. Is human augmentation next, e.g. an augmented soldier, biologically being able to see in the dark or to smell bombs?