Beer Muscles, For Real: Nanotech Super-Strong Artifical Muscles Powered By Hydrogen... And Alcohol

Alcohol and nanotech. Together, they're invincible.

Scientists have developed artificial, super-strength muscles which are powered by alcohol and hydrogen.

And they could eventually be used to make more advanced prosthetic limbs, say researchers at University of Texas.

Writing in Science, they say these artificial muscles are 100 times more powerful than the body's own.

They said they could even be used in "exoskeletons" to give superhuman strength to certain professions such as firefighters, soldiers and astronauts.

Two types of muscle are being investigated by US researchers at the Nanotech Institute at the University of Texas in Dallas, working with colleagues from South Korea.

Both release the chemical energy of fuels, such as hydrogen and alcohol, while consuming oxygen.

In effect they are replicating the first stage in "breathing" - by taking in oxygen. The existing form of artificial muscles are driven by batteries.

However, neither of the types developed by the Texan researchers resembles a normal muscle - being made up of wires, cantilevers and glass bottles.

The most powerful type, "shorted fuel cell muscles" convert chemical energy into heat, causing a special shape-memory metal alloy to contract.

Turning down the heat allows the muscle to relax.

Lab tests showed that these devices had a lifting strength more than 100 times that of normal skeletal muscle.

Another kind of muscle being developed by the team converted chemical energy into electrical energy which caused a material made from carbon nanotube electrodes to bend.

I swear by everything holy, once I get my frigging nanotech super-muscles I'm going to hunt each one of you down and kick each of your asses, starting with the typo police. I'll pepper you with fuel-cell powered punches so that the bruises on your torsos spell out a simple message:

Spell-check is for fairies.

Via Anti-Media.

posted by Ace at 12:16 PM

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