Posted on Thursday, March 01 2007 @ 6:12 CET by Thomas De MaesschalckRobiot Engineering Technology Research Center scientists at the Shandong University of Science and Technology implanted micro electrodes into a pigeon's brain and managed to make it fly left, right, up or down.
The scientists used implants to stimulate different sections of the pigeon brain according to signals that scientists sent via a computer, which forced the pigeon to comply with the operator’s instructions.
Su Xuecheng, chief scientist on the project, said that his trials are the first experiment conducted like this in the world -- the scientists previously tried something similar with lab mice two years ago, with improvements in device design and technology being one of the leading reasons this trial worked.
The Chinese team did not specify exactly how the remote-control pigeon would be utilized in real-world applications. Su has successfully carried out the same experiments on mice since 2005.
