Get your flamethrowers out, people. Zombie cells have been created by scientists in New Mexico. Follow up question: why do weird science things always happen in New Mexico?
Materials scientists at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque have managed to cultivate replicas of mammal cells that function like normal cells but technically they’re not alive.
What makes them not alive? It’s not a Voo Doo curse (which I still believe) but a process using silica. It’s deposited into cells that are heated to burn its “living” proteins, leaving the the “non-living” parts of the cells intact.
So, let’s say you wanted to make an army of living zombies. Does this mean you would need to get a bunch of people to drink silica and then have them sit in a sauna for a couple of hours? (Note to self: avoid spas in case of zombie apocalypse.)
However, these cells aren’t being developed as a publicity stunt for World War Z. Actually, scientists developed these cells for possible use in the field of nanotechnology. I learned from Wikipedia that nanotechnology is being used in a variety of applications from fuel catalysts to socks.
“It’s very challenging for researchers to build structures at the nanometer scale. We can make particles and wires, but 3-D arbitrary structures haven’t been achieved yet. With this technique, we don’t need to build those structures — nature does it for us,” stated Dr. Bryan Kaehr, a researcher at Sandia.
Movie idea: Evil manufacturer uses nanotechnology to make bandages that heal wounds faster, but the nanotechnology used are actually these zombie cells developed in New Mexico. It’s up to a group of teens (who would NEVER hang out with each other on any other day) to not only kill the zombies that result from this undead-inducing bandages, but to also stop this evil manufacturer from taking his or her scheme worldwide. It’s titled Boo Boo Armageddon a.k.a. Gauze of the Dead. Hollywood, it’s yours.
