People Are Playing Video Games With Paramecia
by Jamie Frevele | 3:01 pm, January 15th, 2011
This is a paramecium. You probably haven’t thought about it since 7th-grade biology, but as a refresher, it is a one-celled organism akin to the amoeba. And now scientists have started playing with them. Like pets. But while inserting them into old school video games like Pong and Pac-Man. How exactly have they made this happen, pitting microscopic creatures against each other in Atari games?
A game called PAC-mecium is Pacman with a twist: players use a console to change the polarity of an electrical field in a fluid chamber filled with paramecia, which makes the organisms move in different directions. A camera sends real-time images to a computer, where they are superimposed onto a game board. By looking at the screen, a player can guide the paramecia to eat virtual yeast cells and make them avoid Pacman-like fish. A microprocessor tracks the movement of the organisms to keep score.
So basically, the paramecia are annoyed/irritated into moving in the direction desired by their controllers. I don’t really know how I feel about paramecia becoming the next Sea Monkeys, but Dr. Ingmar Riedel-Kruse says that these “biotic” games can serve as an educational tool for biotechnology and biomedicine. But also: paramecia gladiators.
(Photo via Etsy Seller Caelista, Story via New Scientist)
-
Dr Coene
-
http://twitter.com/dstarpro TheDebster
-
Sweetrose_1997
Eric Limer 
Max 
James Plafke 
Rollin Bishop 
Philosoraptor’s 50 Wisest Musings
There is a Beer That Tastes Like Bacon and Maple Syrup
The 65 Best Planking Pictures From Around the World
11 Fantastic Photos and Videos of Yesterday’s Annular Eclipse
Here’s How to Play the Fully Functional Moog Synthesizer Google Doodle and Four Track Recorder
RSS