Wolverine from X-Men: a beloved fictional comic book hero, and the definition of cool for nerds everywhere. Now, thanks to a combination of artificial intelligence and advances in the physical sciences, wolverine’s super-powers are closer to becoming a reality than you might think. For those of you that aren’t comic book nerds, let’s start with this question: what exactly is Wolverine’s super-power?
When I was younger, although a nerdy kid with an impressive comic book collection, I would probably respond to that question saying, “Oh yeah, he can extend sharp claws from his knuckles-like a wolf. Duh.” While this is an accurate attribute of Wolverine (and perhaps a possible undertaking for modern technology), that isn’t his main power. His main power is self-healing.
So how are we close to engineering a modern-day wolverine? The first promising step took place in 2018, when a team of scientists at Yokohama National University and the University of Tokyo created an ion gel with the ability to self-heal. They achieved this feat through the phenomenon of hydrogen bonds. One of the scientists on the team, Ryota Tamate, states, “Hydrogen bonding is reversible, and as a result, it is a promising interaction that contributes to a material’s ability to self-heal due to their reversible nature. In this study, by tuning the hydrogen bonding strength of polymer chains in ionic liquids, we utilized hydrogen bonding as a reversible cross-linking point of the ion gel.”
The self-healing ionic gel, may sound awesome, and it is, however, it is not enough to recreate Wolverine. If we wanted to use this material on a flexible robot, we would be missing a key ingredient for this robot to self-repair-the ability to feel pain. And the scientific community has been remised of such technology, until very recently. Just yesterday, news was released that scientists from NTU Singapore, using artificial intelligent neural networks, have developed “mini-brains” to connect to sensor nodes for robots to feel sensation (in this case, pain). Outside of this discovery, sensory technology has existed, but not quite like this. Before, sensory input would be sent to a large processing unit (think “big brain”), which would result in delayed response time, and require maintenance. Now, the sensory input can be rapidly processed locally, on the robot’s skin, in the form of a small processesor, hence the“mini-brain.”
So, with these innovations, in addition to the future’s promise for exponential technological growth as well as competition among industries, the implications can be exciting, yet dangerous. Robotic soldiers are already on everyone’s mind, but how about one with the ability to self-heal? A genius invention like a technological wolverine can very well be a major player in the next dumb war we start.
Resources:
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2018-10/ynu-tfo101118.php
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/adma.201802792
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/10/201015101812.htm
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-10/ntu-nss101520.php
