Nice, Mosquito zapper

[Dudde]

I don't know how many of you are ahead of me on this, but I thought it was an interesting article, (posted from CNN because I found it there first)

 

Bug Zapper

 

I don't know if I would be for or against it ecologically...but my skin almost cried with joy

 

anybody think this doo-hickey may become feasible someday? Personally I'm a bit skeptical:

 

The laser, which has been dubbed a "weapon of mosquito destruction" fires at mosquitoes once it detects the audio frequency created by the beating of its wings.

 

The laser beam then destroys the mosquito, burning it on the spot.

[DrP]

Anything designed to kill mozzies is a win in my book! I want one as soon as they are viable. I will walk the countryside with it carving notches into it for every 100 I kill.

[iNow]

I can see this invention opening the door to some serious hilarity... Imagine, for instance, someone wearing a bluetooth earpiece that emits on a similar frequency as the mosquito and them getting repeatedly zapped by your infernal laser... or, perhaps the bug flies behind your grandmothers head as the laser fires and she's caught in the line of sight.

[Sisyphus]

Reminds me of plans I saw once for a "smoke ring" blowing machine that blows rings of propane gas, targeted and triggered by anything over a certain temperature on a thermal imaging camera. No smoking!

[dragonstar57]

it would need to be designed very careful to ensure that it does not hit a Pearson. not to mention that it would make high powered lasers 700 milliwatts commonplace and hard to control

[dragonstar57]

how powerful is this laser i assumed that it was 700 milliwatts but i might be wrong?

[vordhosbn]

I am thinking of reproducing this design...

 

My list so far:

- 2 stepper motors needed for simple vertical axis rotated laser, mounted on a rotating platform (that gives polar coordinates, which are easy to work with)

- 3 high sensitivity microphones to detect the precise direction of the mosquito

- 1 high powered laser diode (I am not sure if I need something else than the diode to fire it?)

- 1 cheap laser pointer (needed for the chassis and the collimation system)

- 1 Atmel ATmega128A microcontroller

- various electronic components - dev circuit, etc.

- a power source - I consider using a rechargeable battery of some kind

- perhaps combined with solar cell to recharge itself during daytime

 

What do you think?

 

Any obvious problems related to the components or the general idea?

Edited September 2, 2010 by vordhosbn

[dragonstar57]

use a ps3 or blu ray diode

Edited September 3, 2010 by cipher510

[vordhosbn]

use a ps3 or blu ray diode

It seems to be rather low in power ( only 5 to 7 mW, while I aim for more like 500 mW).

[dragonstar57]

the blu ray diode is more powerful than anything else that I know of. maybe if you had like 100 of them and focused them into a single beam. but that might make some power loss to interference but i don't think it would be very much. also if you had a beam like the one on your link but (500-700milliwatts) but the same beam divergence a series of focusing lenses (kinda like a funnel) would increase the range.

but if laser DIODES fail. you could use a small co2 laser (20 watt class) like here

http://www.powerlabs.org/laser.htm

but that might be overkill

[vordhosbn]

but that might be overkill

 

When properly focused, the beam will be able to cut through thin metals.

 

lol

 

However with such laser, I can modify the mosquito zapper to a brand new err... weapon - the Robot Insta Kill Zapper.

Edited September 3, 2010 by vordhosbn

[CaptainPanic]

Time to talk ethics. Time to look for trouble, and play the devil's advocate.

So, let's assume we reduce the mosquito population of the world by 99.9%? Or a 100%? What are the effects, other than 7 billion happy people?

 

Mosquitos are food for other animals (fish food in larve stage, and spider and bird food in mosquito stage). Killing mosquitos might kill off other species as well.

 

And...

 

Eeh...

 

Do mosquitos serve any other purpose other than that they just happen to be part of the food chain?

 

I think that just being part of the food chain isn't good enough. If that's the only reason to preserve the bastards, they can go extinct.

[vordhosbn]

Yes the ethical part is a bit concerning. After all this is a device, designed to kill other living beings.

However my point of view, is that, although I am pretty tolerant to all kind of lifeforms, without preference of how close or far to our species on the evolutionary tree, in the moment that some of these animals try to literally eat me... I feel morally justified to defend myself using any means necessary.

[dragonstar57]

did you read the article? no one would miss mosquitoes! not even fish and birds.

malaria and west Nile virus might but oh well

 

seriously somebody should design the laser for this!

[Mr Skeptic]

The laser only hits 1 spot. This is not a laser beam, it is a beam focused onto one spot. If you are far from that spot even directly behind it, you only get hit by a harmless bit of light. Think of how you can survive sunlight just fine but then you can use it and a magnifying glass to burn ants.

[dragonstar57]

lol

 

However with such laser, I can modify the mosquito zapper to a brand new err... weapon - the Robot Insta Kill Zapper.

 

a weapon of robot destruction? lol

Edited September 3, 2010 by cipher510

[CaptainPanic]

did you read the article? no one would miss mosquitoes! not even fish and birds.

 

malaria and west Nile virus might but oh well

 

seriously somebody should design the laser for this!

"No one would miss mosquitoes" was a statement made by an astrophysicist... not a great authority on details of the eco-systems and food chains around the world.

 

But even if there are some animals that live on a diet of mosquitos, it may be worth the price.

 

A consideration though:

If we kill many mosquitos, the mosquito predators may suffer. If we then drop the program, or the machine breaks, the mosquitos will be back soon enough... but the predators may never make a come back. It's a kind of mistake that you can only make once.

[dragonstar57]

perhaps a biologist should take a look at the idea

[Rickdog]

Mosquitos are food for other animals (fish food in larve stage, and spider and bird food in mosquito stage). Killing mosquitos might kill off other species as well.

 

Do mosquitos serve any other purpose other than that they just happen to be part of the food chain?

 

I think that just being part of the food chain isn't good enough. If that's the only reason to preserve the bastards, they can go extinct.

 

Not so simple my friend, by being so numerous in an equilibrated echological system, it means that their numbers are necessary to maintan the equilibrium in the system. Once you wipe them out, lots of changes will occur in the system. At first only those species who feed on them will suffer the consequences, but once their populations also decrease, as they are also part in this food chain other species will suffer their own lack of food, not mentioning that many species that feed on the mosquitoes or the predators who prey on their predators, might also affect the pollinization of plants and the development of species that are part of the menu of human beings too, which of course will bring starvation and due to this problem, a diminishing in the peoples inmune system, which can make them more susceptible of acquiring other diseases even more fatal than the ones that these little bastards can transmitt. Among them other diseaeses, which don`t depend on other potential vectors, but the same human beings. Its a very long chain of events where these small individuals can affect in one way or another.

 

If a weapon like this becomes available, wiser would be to use it moderately and study the effects on each application on the system, before applying it massively, so if in the most smallest sign of harm to the echological system, you can be able to revert its efffect, by stop using it.

 

I`m sorry to say, but we have to learn how to live with these little bastards.

Edited September 11, 2010 by Rickdog

[dragonstar57]

then we could breed a insect that would replace Mosquitoes (one that doesn't bite )

but even if that were imposable the aims is not to eradicate Mosquitoes it would be used to create a anti-Mosquito "fence" around towns and villages to protect the populous from malaria (or any of the countless other diseases that Mosquitoes carry)

 

just starred a thread about focusing multiple beams into one

http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/51766-laser-question/