New Electronics Can Dissolve and Disappear When They're No Longer Needed - Polidicks

[QUOTE]A new class of electronics can dissolve and disappear on a pre-set schedule, within a few minutes or a few years, depending on when you want them to go away. They could live in the body and deliver drugs, they could stick on the exterior of buildings or tanks, and they can become compost instead of metal scrap--in other words, they turn the common conception of electronics completely upside down. Transient electronics, as they’ve been dubbed, are a combination of silk and silicon designed to work seamlessly in our bodies and in our environments. In a new study, researchers built a thermal device designed to monitor infection in a rodent and a 64-pixel digital camera--all from dissolvable material. Suk-Won Hwang of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and several colleagues made circuits out of silkworm cocoons, superthin sheets of porous silicon, and electrodes made of magnesium. All these materials are biocompatible and because they’re extremely thin and soluble, they dissolve even in minute quantities of water. The silk is the main structural scaffold, and it determines the dissolution rate of the entire device. Biomedical engineer Fiorenzo Omenetto at Tufts University, a coauthor, figured out how to adjust the silk protein’s properties so it degrades at a wide range of intervals. The silk is dissolved and then re-crystallized, and by controlling the crystallization, the researchers can control the rate at which it dissolves again. In a major test of the platform’s biocompatibility, the team engineered a silk biomedical implant in a mouse. The device was programmed to break down after a certain length of time in which it was exposed to bodily fluids, and then it was doped with an antibacterial compound. The team implanted it in an infected surgical site and after three weeks, the infection was reduced and small residual pieces of the implant could be detected. Here’s a list of other items they’ve built so far: transient transistors; diodes; wireless power coils; temperature and strain sensors; photodetectors; solar cells; radio oscillators and antennas; and digital cameras. There is a huge array of possible uses for this technology, which is partly funded by DARPA. Even when they’re likely to be obsolete the moment you buy them, modern electronics are built to last. When they’re no longer needed, they pile up in our houses, recycling centers or landfills. Transient electronics could be a solution--a device can be programmed to last a few years, and then completely dissolve when it’s rendered obsolete. The research appears in this week’s issue of Science. [img]http://www.popsci.com/files/imagecache/article_image_large/articles/dropper.png[/img] [I]As soon as it comes in contact with water, the circuit starts to break down. Fiorenzo Omenetto [/I] [img]http://www.popsci.com/files/imagecache/article_image_large/articles/droplet.png[/img] [I]The Circuit Dissolves: A resorbable electronic circuit is shown in its first phases of dissolution. Fiorenzo Omenetto[/I][/quote] Source: [url]http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2012-09/new-vanishing-electronics-can-dissolve-and-disappear-when-theyre-no-longer-needed[/url]

Disposable computers.

I can see this being utilized for trial offers for computers or something. . . I definitely seeing this having a high abuse potential; but an equally massive potential for medicine, tracking of wildlife migrations, and many other areas.

That combined with compostable plastic is brilliant.

This is going to make planned obsolescence easier :<

[QUOTE=MaxOfS2D;37858486]This is going to make planned obsolescence easier :<[/QUOTE] or it will be easier to recover materials used in computers and ultimately dispose of it.

[QUOTE=Habsburg;37858523]or it will be easier to recover materials used in computers and ultimately dispose of it.[/QUOTE] Or both you know

I wonder how this would work in high humidity areas.

I can see every company using this just so people will upgrade

[QUOTE=Intoxicated Spy;37858596]I can see every company using this just so people will upgrade[/QUOTE] Reminds me of those TV Samsung made where they used a super cheap part that would break after a year More often than not repair shops didn't have a clue about this and they'd replace the whole thing instead of just the $2 capacitor that broke

[QUOTE=Intoxicated Spy;37858596]I can see every company using this just so people will upgrade[/QUOTE]It will become illegal for such purposes really fast. Especially in EU

So does it actually biodegrade when dissolved, or does it just "break apart" Because if its the latter then this isn't so great. Plastic dissolves in sunlight and water, but it doesn't actually break down - meaning that that one spot in the ocean full of trash and dissolved plastic doesn't actually go away. Instead of all the plastic being in the bottle, it's now dissolved into thousands of tiny plastic chunks/particles. Still there, still just as bad, except now its smaller and suspended in the water instead of being apart of a bottle or something (which means small fish can eat it thinking its food, but instead it kills them). Of course metal is natural to the ground while plastic is not, so metal circuts breaking down might not be so bad/polluting as plastic bottles breaking down.

iphones break every year on the dot

[QUOTE=MaxOfS2D;37858486]This is going to make planned obsolescence easier :<[/QUOTE] And that sucks; this technology is going to be absolutely USELESS for long-term "wetware", aka hardware plugins for the human body. Still, an H+ advocate could argue that we probably won't need surgery to remove it, but on another note why not just have durable "port" or "socket" implants for easy wetware installation? This kinda stuff is spawned from the modern culture wherein it's cheaper to replace something than to have it repaired, and in my opinion that should be criminal; if China and other major sources of manufacturing outsourcing end up collapsing somehow, we'll need to divert our technologies towards making mechanisms, components and items that're built to last and can easily be repaired. On a more offtopic note, what's with the massive title Max; did a pony bite you?

"THIS COMMUNICATION WILL SELF-DESTRUCT IN 5...4...3...2...1" *dissolves*

Soon, Call of Duty Modern Warfare 13 which only lasts a year before the disc dissolves itself and shows "See you soon on Call of Duty Modern Warfare 14." by then.

So this is what Brother printers are made of!

now i can hold all my child porn and when the police come i'll dissolve my computer

"Welcome! Don't spill shit on the computers." :v: I think this is pretty interesting. Like everyone else is saying, though, I can't hjelp but feel this could be abused.

[QUOTE=ironman17;37858871]And that sucks; this technology is going to be absolutely USELESS for long-term "wetware", aka hardware plugins for the human body. Still, an H+ advocate could argue that we probably won't need surgery to remove it, but on another note why not just have durable "port" or "socket" implants for easy wetware installation?[/QUOTE] I disagree. Prosthetics were actually one of the first things I thought of when I read this, I think it could be very useful in separating the 'brain' from the machine in order to upgrade it, not necessarily after X amount of time but whenever the owner chooses to upgrade. I would imagine it could make repairing or improving existing prosthetic devices much faster and cheaper. Or not. I'm talking entirely out of my butt here, but a little optimism never hurts.

Drop your phone in water, it literally is fucked

and then it rains the end

Oh god, that will make spilling my drink on my desk even worse.

i hope this does not cause such abuse like hackers trying to dissolve your computer or cooperation add in a "dissolve noticed" when your "part license" is expired and set a date for it to where your hardware is dissolved on that date.

Apple/EA will get ahold of this technology and shit will go raw.

Oh shit, I spilled water on my keyboard! And there she goes. I am scared that something like that might happen, but probably won't.

Well at least a grey goo scenario is less likely now.

I wonder if this would have use for covert military stuff? Say you have a probe or sensor feeding back information from a hidden location, and when it's done it breaks down. Or letting 'sensitive' electrical equipment or components on things like drones and planes auto-breakdown in the event of a crash or a loss of control signal dissolve themselves to prevent them being copied.

I can see this being horribly abused. Make it dissolve in a special liquid and not just water.

Gets a 2 year warranty, they use this so your device breaks after 2.1 years >_>