Researchers from the University of Florida are outfitting trained rats with neural implants and a wireless radio so that the rodents can scurry through collapsed buildings searching for survivors. The electrodes are implanted in the rat's olfactory cortex, motor cortex, and reward center. When a rat–trained to seek out the smell of human–finds its target, the "aha! moment" can then be wireless transmitted back to headquarters. From a New Scientist article about the DARPA-funded work:
The researchers trained the rats to search for human odour by stimulating the reward centre when it found its target smell. Once the rats were trained, they were set to forage for the target smell, while electrodes recorded their neural activity patterns.
This allowed researchers to identify the brainwave patterns associated with finding that smell. They were also able to train the rats to sniff out the explosives TNT and RDX – key after terrorist attacks that may leave buildings harbouring unexploded bombs.
