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Latest advances in science are leading to the rise of a new generation of super-smart and nano scale computing machines, which tend to blur the distinction between electronics and biology. These machines are as flexible as human skin or the tissue. Instead of existing outside the body, they become part of the bodys intrinsic biological system, and make all kinds of computing functionalities available to the user.
An international team of scientists from USA, China and Singapore have developed an epidermal electronic system (EES), which is basically an electronic patch of thin rubbery substrate that can easily adhere to the skin like any temporary tattoo. In the EES, the advanced electronic circuits include sensors, light-emitting diodes, transistors, radio frequency capacitors, wireless antennas, conductive coils and solar cells.
The EES is a wireless device with hardly any height. It is less than 50-microns thick, which makes it slightly thinner than a human hair. It requires so little power that it can fuel it self through miniature solar collectors, or even from the electromagnetic impulses that get generated in or around the body. It does not need any glue to stick to the skin; the normal electrostatic impulse is enough to bond the EES to the skin.
Experts are of the opinion that this device could have a significant impact in the fields of medical sensing, computer gaming and even spy operations. We can easily envisage the rise of a new generation of wearable electronics. How about a smartphone that can be bonded to the skin of your hand or is firmly embedded to it! As it is part of your body, it could connect you to the cyber world and also the parts of real world in ways that we cant possible imagine right now.
The EES technology has maximum potential in the field of health. We could have a simple stick-on circuit monitor that will keep track of a human beings heart rate and muscle movements and other vital functions. As it is weightless, it does not encumber the user in anyway, and it is virtually undetectable. It is also possible to have an EES that gets connected to a persons throat, around the larynx, and transmits a persons speech even if he is not making any discernible sound.
Of course, a device this small can also be used for spying. An EES capable of recording and transmitting all kinds of information can be implanted on a target. Perhaps in future this is going to be the more popular way by which anyone can spy on his or her partner. There is no doubt a weightless undetectable machine like EES can pose risk to privacy, but that is one side effect that we have to learn to live with.
The work on perfecting the design of the EES has been going on for last six years. Advanced electronic circuitry for a patch that is as soft as the human skin has already been developed; now the focus is on adding battery power and other energy options. John Rogers and Todd Coleman, two of the scientists who have been working on the project say that the EES is a big step in erasing the divide that separates machine and human.
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