illuminating science

Interesting story over at ABC News on a new technique which allows skin cells to grow on metal. Everyone’s interested in this because it might prove a way of making artificial limbs which are lighter, stronger and hopefully more useful than existing models. And, if the skin really can be grown over the top of them, perhaps even smoothly integrated with the body.

The article itself has taken the Terminator/cyborg slant, which makes the article appealing, I guess, but it suggests connotations of artificial intelligence (evil, of course) rather than the more “mundane” job of replacing limbs. And, of course, actual application of the technology is no doubt years down the track, but nonetheless interesting. But perhaps combined with the various BrainGate technologies for interfacing brains with computers, we really will be seeing cyborg technology sooner rather than later.