Does E = mc² or mc³? The Science in Bond Films Thread

RichardTheBruce

This beautiful and popular flower contains a deadly poison. CC-BY 2.0/Gail Hampshire

Introducing the poison that inspired Van Gogh and
almost killed James Bond: Digoxin

See the complete article here:

https://sciencenordic.com/denmark-health-heart/introducing-the-poison-that-inspired-van-gogh-and-almost-killed-james-bond-digoxin/2060566

wednesday 21. September 2022

The otherwise innocent-looking flower Digitalis contains the poison that can make your heart stop. That unfortunate effect is also the reason why the poison has been used for treating heart ailments for more than 200 years.

• Timothy Patrick Jenkins assistant professor at the department of biotechnology and biomedicine, Technical University of Denmark
• Lorenzo Seneci guest researcher at the department of biotechnology and biomedicine, Technical University of Denmark
• Christoffer V. Sørensen PhD student
• Charlotte Risager Christensen Bachelor’s student at the Department of Biotechnology and Biomedicine, Technical University of Denmark

After only a few sips of an otherwise innocent-looking martini, James Bond is shakingly leaving the game of poker against the villain Le Chiffre. The rhythm of his heart is being disturbed by the poison in his veins, causing him to promptly contact the MI6 headquarters. They immediately conclude that 007 is suffering from ventricular tachycardia (VT), a specific type of abnormal heart rhythm, caused by the plant toxin digoxin.

Bond nearly dies but is saved by shock from a defibrillator at the very last moment.

This famous depiction of digoxin poisoning comes from the James Bond movie “Casino Royale”. This toxin is derived from an otherwise harmless looking plant with bell shaped flowers of varying colours such as purple, white, and yellow. The plant is called foxglove (genus Digitalis) and throughout time it has caused many deaths while at the same time saving many lives – both thanks to its potent poison.

The deadly effects of digoxin have been known for over 400 years, and yet even the great 007 almost fell to the poison of a simple foxglove plant- already enough of a reason to explore what makes digoxin so lethal.

The sly features of digoxin
What makes digoxin lethal is also what makes it intriguing, resulting in its frequent appearances in fiction. The fascination for this toxin might stem from some of its many sly features:

1. Foxglove is easily accessible due to its wide distribution throughout most of Europe, the US, and Canada.
2. Digoxin poisoning is very slow-acting as the toxic effects manifest 30 minutes to 2 hours after ingestion. Also, symptoms of digoxin poisoning can be easily mistaken for other illnesses, both of which makes identification of poisoning by foxglove difficult.
3. Lastly, the poisoning will result in heart-attack and ultimately death. However, since heart-attack can be caused by many factors, foul play is often not suspected in cases of poisoning.

Overall, digoxin is easily accessible, difficult to trace, and extremely lethal, which has made the toxin particularly popular as a murder weapon in fiction- and sometimes even in reality.

Admittedly, not many homicides by digoxin have been reported to date, though it is possible that several cases might have been missed due to the exceptionally concealed mechanism of the toxin.

Nevertheless, a few high-profile cases have been confirmed over the years, including one from Toronto's Hospital in 1980–1981. In this case, a nurse was charged with the murder of four babies by poisoning with digoxin. An older case from 1935 in Belgium reports a total of 26 murders via digoxin poisoning by a woman tending to elderly patients.

But how exactly does the poison work?

Many species of Digitalis exist, all of which are highly toxic. Left: Common foxglove (Digitalis purpurea) Top right: Woolly foxglove (Digitalis lanata), the digoxin-producing specimen. Bottom right: Yellow foxglove (Digitalis grandiflora).
Picture: Katya.

The heart-stopping mechanism of digoxin
Irregular heart rhythm and eventually heart-attack is what makes digoxin poisoning so dangerous. When digoxin enters the body, it binds a transport protein called the sodium-potassium pump situated on heart cells. Binding of digoxin blocks the pump, ultimately resulting in heart muscle contraction caused by a complex chain of responses.

To understand this mechanism, it is essential to know how muscle contraction works. An important factor for muscle contraction is calcium – high concentrations of it induce contraction of muscle fibres, whereas low concentrations cause relaxation.

To keep things simple, we can say that this mechanism is primarily regulated by three proteins: The calcium channel (here called the ‘activator’), the sodium-calcium exchanger (which functions as the ‘relaxer’) and the sodium-potassium pump (interpreted as the ‘motor’).

When the activator opens, calcium is imported into the muscle cell, activating the muscle, and causing it to contract. For the muscle to relax, calcium must then be removed by the relaxer.

This transport can only occur if the concentration of sodium inside the cell is low. This is the function of the motor, which keeps sodium levels low in the cell. Thus, one can think of the motor as a battery powering up the relaxer.

When digoxin is present, it blocks the function of the motor, leading to decreased functionality of the relaxer in turn. This blockage causes irregular heartbeats and – in the worst cases – heart-attack since the muscle can’t relax properly.

The dysfunction of the heart rhythm can also lead to symptoms of weakness, disorientation, and even vision disturbances. Interestingly, one of the more commonly observed effects of digoxin on vision is the appearance of a yellow tinge in all objects (See textbox below).

The action of digoxin. Activation of the muscle leads to import of calcium resulting in muscle contraction. Under normal conditions the relaxer will export calcium, relaxingthe muscle. In a poisoned individual the motor will be blocked leading to a dysfunctional relaxer, thereby causing the muscle to keep contracting.

If poisoned, don’t do as James Bond
So how can you counter the effects of digoxin poisoning?

First of all, it is of crucial importance that the functional heart rhythm is regained. In Casino Royale, Bond saves himself with a defibrillator.

In reality, this is not recommended since this method is generally ineffective for correction of heart rhythm in patients with digoxin poisoning.

Instead, the first measure to be considered is the decontamination of the poisoned individual if the poisoning is caused by ingestion.

This should be done by ingestion of activated charcoal since this can bind remaining toxin in the stomach. After decontamination, a digoxin antidote ought to be administered.

Currently, the only available antidote is called DigiFab. It consists of antibody fragments sourced from sheep immunized with digoxin. When administered, the antibody fragments will bind digoxin, which in turn cannot bind to, and block, the motor.

Treating digoxin poisoning can in general be quite challenging since the toxin is extremely small and therefore spreads widely throughout the body, which makes clearance especially tricky. Having said that, Digifab is still life-saving in the majority of digoxin poisoning cases.

However, the antidote is often not administered due to cost considerations. In fact, the price of this product is very high (up to USD 60k per treatment) which leads to only 25% of poisoned patients actually receiving the drug.

Thus, digoxin poisoning can be a very dangerous situation to be in, without many treatment options.

Function of digoxin antidote. The antidote (blue) will bind the digoxin molecules (yellow) which in turn cannot bind to and block the motor (purple).

One of the oldest medicaments for troubled hearts
Despite its lethality, digoxin can also be beneficial to human health when administered at the correct dosage.

In fact, this toxin has been used therapeutically for around 200 years for treatment of heart disease, which makes it one of the oldest medicaments in cardiology.

Digoxin is beneficial in heart disease treatment since it increases the force of heart contractions and reduces the heart rate by blocking the motor.

This action is useful in treatment of several heart conditions such as congestive heart failure (-meaning that the heart does not pump blood efficiently), atrial fibrillation (irregular and excessively rapid heartbeat) and other heart rhythm conditions.

Due to the high prevalence of heart disease in the 21st century and the low price of 0.47 – 0.56 USD per pill, digoxin is widely used globally - around 66,000 patients in Denmark receive it each year and it was the 184th most prescribed medication in the United States in 2018, with more than 4 million prescriptions. Unsurprisingly, most of the patients receiving the drug are elderly, with nearly one-third being 85 years of age or older.

An example of Van Gogh's use of yellow which might have been caused by digoxin poisoning.

Was Van Gogh’s vision affected by digoxin poisoning?
One of the more common indications of digoxin poisoning is vision disturbances. Often people report experiencing a yellow tinge to everything they see. This condition is also known by the name xanthopsia. It has been suggested that this condition is at the root of what is known as Vincent van Gogh’s “yellow period”. This theory is supported by two portraits of Van Gogh’s doctor, Paul Gachet, where he is depicted holding a foxglove flower. The artist may at this time have taken foxglove for treatment of epileptic seizures, although today it is known that digoxin is not suitable for treatment of epilepsy. Due to this misconception, Van Gogh could have unintentionally overdosed with digoxin leading to the yellow tint in many of his paintings.

Thin line between treatment and poisoning
Although many patients are treated with digoxin, it carries serious risks if administered incorrectly.

In fact, the toxic dose of digoxin is only 1.6 times that of the therapeutic dose, meaning that minimal overdosing can result in severe poisoning.

Dosing of digoxin is not an easy task since differences in body size, age, and multiple other factors can change the response of different patients to the therapy.

As a result, toxicity often occurs among chronic users (especially in elderly patients or patients with renal impairment) , with a mortality rate between 7-30%.

Additionally, it is estimated that over 5000 emergency department visits for digoxin toxicity occur annually in the United States. Thus, poisoning from clinical use is actually the most common reason for digoxin poisoning-not malicious assassination attempts like the one depicted in Casino Royale.

Because of this, other drugs are now preferred for treatment of heart disease, such as Angiotensin-Converting Enzyme (ACE), Angiotensin Receptor Blockers (ARBs) and Beta-blockers.

In general, the matter is still debated and differences in heart conditions and patient response to different drugs all affect which drug option is the best in each individual case.

Thus, there is a need for either safer dosing or improved options for treatment of toxicity. Otherwise, digoxin is likely to be replaced by alternate drugs in future heart disease treatment. In the meantime, we can at least take a valuable lesson from 007’s life-threatening encounter with digoxin: no matter how fancy the event, never accept a martini from a mysterious stranger.

The article was originally published on our danish sister site Forskerzonen.

References

• ‘Digitalis poisoning: historical and forensic aspects’, Journal of the American College of Cardiology (1983), DOI: 10.1016/s0735-1097(83)80080-1
• ‘Digoxin: clinical highlights: a review of digoxin and its use in contemporary medicine’, Critical pathways in Cardiology’ (2011), DOI: 10.1097/HPC.0b013e318221e7dd
• ‘Pharmacological treatment of cardiac glycoside poisoning’, British journal of clinical pharmacology (2016), DOI: 10.1111/bcp.12814
• ‘Digoxin Toxicity and Use of Digoxin Immune Fab: Insights From a National Hospital Database’, JACC: Heart Failure (2016), DOI: 10.1016/j.jchf.2016.01.011
• ‘Emergency Department Visits and Hospitalizations for Digoxin Toxicity’, Circulation: Heart Failure (2014), DOI: 10.1161/CIRCHEARTFAILURE.113.000784
• ‘Drugs for Heart Failure’, MSD Manual (2020)

j_w_pepper

Regarding digitalis/foxglove (German: "Fingerhut" = thimble in English). We've had it in our garden/yard for decades, not having planted it, and in previous places before. It is a wonderful and attractive plant, and we're happy to see each one of them when they bloom in spring or summer. And everybody here knows that they're poisonous, but beyond that, nobody cares. The plant is also protected, so you mustn't even pull any of them out...which won't change much anyway, since their seeds are all over the place.

I love them and cherish them and refuse to condemn them, since I won't eat them. They're absolutely welcome in our place. A beautiful gift of nature.

CommanderRoss

j_w_pepper wrote: »

Regarding digitalis/foxglove (German: "Fingerhut" = thimble in English). We've had it in our garden/yard for decades, not having planted it, and in previous places before. It is a wonderful and attractive plant, and we're happy to see each one of them when they bloom in spring or summer. And everybody here knows that they're poisonous, but beyond that, nobody cares. The plant is also protected, so you mustn't even pull any of them out...which won't change much anyway, since their seeds are all over the place.

I love them and cherish them and refuse to condemn them, since I won't eat them. They're absolutely welcome in our place. A beautiful gift of nature.

They grow in your garden... do you have more plants with similar attributes in your garden?......

j_w_pepper

CommanderRoss wrote: »

j_w_pepper wrote: »

Regarding digitalis/foxglove (German: "Fingerhut" = thimble in English). We've had it in our garden/yard for decades, not having planted it, and in previous places before. It is a wonderful and attractive plant, and we're happy to see each one of them when they bloom in spring or summer. And everybody here knows that they're poisonous, but beyond that, nobody cares. The plant is also protected, so you mustn't even pull any of them out...which won't change much anyway, since their seeds are all over the place.

I love them and cherish them and refuse to condemn them, since I won't eat them. They're absolutely welcome in our place. A beautiful gift of nature.

They grow in your garden... do you have more plants with similar attributes in your garden?......

Not really. Our real enemies are wild blackberries, whose shoots (several meters long before you realise it) overgrow everything else, and prick your skin all the way through thick gloves when you try to remove them. Or wild black cherries (prunus serotina), which are really an invasive species which we would like to get rid of.

But I suppose quite a few plants we have here (intentionally or unintentionally) also qualify as being sort of poisonous. It's all a question of the dose one swallows.

No competition for Safin's island, at any rate.

RichardTheBruce

Moonraker was the most obvious, but not the only,
Bond movie with a space theme. (credit: United Artists)

Bond, in orbit

See the complete article here:

https://www.thespacereview.com/article/779/1

by Dwayne A. Day
Monday, January 8, 2007

Last week, Amazon.com billionaire Jeff Bezos revealed images and video footage of the November test flight of his Goddard rocket in the Texas desert. Bezos’ company, Blue Origin, has been operating in extreme secrecy. But why should we expect anything else? It is, after all, what we’ve been fed by the movies for five decades.

The concept of billionaire businessmen developing secret space programs is not a new one. In fact, it has existed in science fiction literature and film for decades. One could trace it back at least to Robert Heinlein, whose screenplay for the 1950 movie Destination Moon featured a rich industrialist sponsoring an atomic-powered rocketship to the Moon. But the much more common, familiar, and tired cliché comes from James Bond movies, where rich industrialists have usually employed space to evil purposes.

Of course, James Bond movies suck. Yes, the latest Bond film, Casino Royale, has been widely praised for essentially rewriting the Bond genre and dispensing with many of the silliness in favor of a more muscular and raw protagonist. However, one film does not make a trend, and over the years Bond movies have demonstrated a number of overused characteristics: too many gadgets that prove to be perfectly suited for whatever predicament Bond finds himself stuck in, sexist character names, lame double-entendres, and, of course, megalomaniacal rich supervillains.

The concept of billionaire businessmen developing secret space programs is not a new one. In fact, it has existed in science fiction literature and film for decades.

However, despite their overall godawfulness, Bond movies often also feature clever plot ideas that really belong in much better movies. Occasionally an unremarkable non-Bond movie will contain a great Bond-like idea that should be in an even better movie, but then gets stolen for a Bond movie. This has happened a few times. For instance, Jackie Chan’s amusing Rumble in the Bronx featured a fantastic action sequence involving a massive hovercraft barreling down a city street. That was cool. Bond lamely ripped it off in 2002’s Die Another Day, where it became a smaller hovercraft used in a chase through a minefield. It’s such a great idea that it really does deserve a better movie than either of these.

Which brings us, in a very roundabout way, to the subject of James Bond movies and space. James Bond movies offer several examples of neat space storylines or plot ideas that really deserved to be in better movies. There have been twenty-one Bond movies, and space themes have appeared in five of them. In most cases, the script took a good idea and then hyped it into something silly. This started very early in the Bond franchise, in fact, right at the beginning.

Dr. No
The very first Bond movie, and the one that supplied the iconic image of Ursula Andress emerging from the ocean in a bikini. It is also the least typical Bond film, but does involve the stereotypical, rich evil genius up to nefarious deeds. This time the evil rich villain wants to interfere with an American Mercury spacecraft launch. However, Bond conveniently blows up a nuclear reactor in Jamaica, foiling the plot. The movie does not bother to explain how irradiating the Caribbean is a superior outcome, however, especially when one considers that hurricanes come from that general direction—atomic hurricanes, now that would be bad (but might make for an amusing movie).

You Only Live Twice
This 1967 movie started with a Gemini spacecraft being abducted in orbit by another spacecraft that moved in behind it, opened its payload fairing, and swallowed it like an alligator, leaving one spacewalking astronaut outside to float to his doom. Naturally, Bond is sent to investigate and discovers that evil billionaire Ernst Blofeld is trying to instigate global war by capturing both American and Russian spacecraft. He commands his forces from his headquarters inside an extinct volcano from which he launches his rockets. This concept might have seemed cool and futuristic in the midst of the space race, but it is partially undone by limited special effects. The plot device of the evil billionaire instigating mayhem, usually by stealing something belonging to a superpower, and then being taken down when his command center is attacked by commandoes led by James Bond, was recycled numerous times, most notably in both The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker.

Diamonds Are Forever
In this 1971 movie Bond discovered that the nefarious Ernst Blofeld was stockpiling diamonds for his massive laser satellite that he intended to use to fry various targets around the globe. His adventures take him to Las Vegas, where he gets involved in a moon-buggy chase in the desert. The diamond-studded satellite gets launched and blasts an American ICBM, a Soviet nuclear submarine (under water) and a Chinese missile base. Naturally, Bond wins in the end by leading a massive firepower-heavy assault on the bad guy’s offshore oil platform lair.

The movie is yet another frustrating example of the Bond genre, filled with both silliness and clever ideas, although the special effects had notably improved since 1967. It is clear from the various Bond space movies that the screenwriters at least did some homework about real spaceflight. In this case, the satellite is launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base, which actually makes a lot of sense, because a satellite launched into a polar orbit from there could cover the entire globe.

Remember when the Space Shuttle was still full of promise and seemed incredibly futuristic? That was around 1979 or so, and Bond was there, trying to capitalize on the sci-fi genre reinvigorated by Star Wars.

Unlike You Only Live Twice, this time it is clear that Blofeld doesn’t have his own space program and actually has to find a real aerospace company to build his satellite, which he does by secretly taking over an American company run by a billionaire American aerospace executive clearly modeled on Howard Hughes. In a surprising twist, the man is neither batty nor evil. He does, however, have the Texas accent and attitude that the British consider to be shorthand for the American cowboy swagger that they publicly despise, but often secretly admire.

Moonraker
Remember when the Space Shuttle was still full of promise and seemed incredibly futuristic? That was around 1979 or so, and Bond was there, trying to capitalize on the sci-fi genre reinvigorated by Star Wars. Once again an evil billionaire has concluded that once you’ve become insanely rich, the only thing left to do is kill everybody on the planet and remake it in your own image. This time the evil villain is named Hugo Drax, who, despite his megalomania, seems awfully bored, if not downright sleepy, for most of the movie.

Drax runs an aerospace empire, manufacturing space shuttles and training astronauts for NASA (an early example of NewSpace, anyone?) But when one of NASA’s space shuttles is abducted in flight (firing its main engines from the back of a 747 despite the lack of any fuel tank), Bond investigates and discovers that Drax has a plan to wipe out humanity with a nerve gas and then breed a new master race based upon his herd of perfect, scantily-clad astropeople—all of whom will live on Drax’s orbiting space station.

Based largely upon its campiness and derivative plot, Moonraker is widely regarded as one of the worst Bond films, but it was the highest grossing Bond movie in the US until GoldenEye, sixteen years later. Is it a coincidence that spaceflight (human and robotic, respectively) was integral to the plots of both films?

The criticisms of Moonraker abound: a plot essentially stolen from the previous film The Spy Who Loved Me, stunning action sequences and locales that have little connection to the actual plot, and a performance by Lois Chiles as CIA agent/astronaut Holly Goodhead (insert obligatory snicker here), who is more wooden than a tree. Rather surprisingly, the special effects actually tend to slow the film down rather than add excitement. Of course, watching a Space Shuttle dock with the real space station is not exactly gripping entertainment, so it is hard to see how Moonraker could have made it seem dramatic. The movie would have benefited from some judicious editing, not to mention recasting, starting with actors who possessed some actual charisma in addition to nice legs (on Ms. Chiles, not the guy who played Drax—although I will confess to falling in love with the doomed Drax helicopter pilot Corinne Cleary the first time I saw her).

Drax has to steal a NASA shuttle to replace one of his own, which suffered from manufacturing flaws. This was not terribly original, because at the time the movie was made the actual shuttle was then over a year behind schedule due to problems with the main engines and the thermal tiles. Drax has six shuttles that he launches from underground silos in the Amazon jungle (where does one find a construction company willing to do that kind of work?) The models were excellent, although the special effects appear dated today. The initial liftoff of the shuttles is almost as realistic as the actual launches that started only two years later—primarily missing the huge smoke plumes produced by the solid rocket boosters. Some of the effects are cheesy. For instance, to produce a smoke effect that streamed away rather than floated up around the shuttle, the special effects team filled a small model with salt, which then drained out in a thin white trail. Far worse is the space station design. Intended to look like a spider, it makes absolutely no sense at all. There is no way to get gravity by spinning such a contraption. The bigger sin is that it is one of the stupidest-looking space stations ever committed to film.

But one parallel to the real space program is Drax’s megalomaniacal vision, which, except for the killing all of humanity part, shares some similarity with longstanding space enthusiast dreams of conquering the heavens:

First there was the dream, now there is reality. Here in the untamed cradle of the heavens will be created a new super race, a race of perfect physical specimens. You have been selected as its progenitors. Like gods, your offspring will return to Earth and shape it in their image. You have all served in public capacities in my terrestrial empire. Your seed, like yourselves, will pay deference to the ultimate dynasty which I alone have created. From their first day on Earth, they will be able to look up and know that there is law and order in the heavens.

Okay, maybe not too much similarity… Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, and others want to build affordable rockets to send humans into space, but to date there has been no indication that they are actually intending to conquer the planet or breed a new race of supermen.
Despite its flaws, Moonraker also had some clever ideas and concepts.

Drax’s speech does bring up a little question, however: when his genetically and physically perfect breeding stock learned that all their friends and families were going to be wiped out with nerve gas, did they have any problem with that? Or was the promise of zero-gee procreation simply too good to resist?

Despite its flaws, Moonraker also had some clever ideas and concepts. Upon discovering Drax’s space station, the United States launches Marines aboard a Space Shuttle from Vandenberg Air Force Base, where the US Air Force actually constructed a shuttle launch site that was never used. In a poetic touch, Drax’s killer nerve agent is concocted from a flower known as the Black Orchid, which itself was responsible for the deaths of the Amazonian tribe that cultivated it, and whose ruins he now inhabits.

If you’re a chauvinist, the most clever idea in the entire film is the sexist concept of putting leggy female astronauts in low-cut miniskirt uniforms. It’s a far cry from the plain blue jumpsuits that NASA uses, and not terribly practical. Of course, that wasn’t really the point.

GoldenEye
This passable 1995 film wins my vote as the Bond movie with the best plot device worthy of a better movie: a space-based electromagnetic pulse weapon. The story is that during the Cold War the Soviet Union developed the GoldenEye satellite, equipped with a nuclear device capable of generating a single massive, directed-energy electromagnetic pulse that can fry all electronics for tens of square miles. They placed two of them in orbit before the country fell apart. A Russian crime syndicate with plans for holding the West hostage steals a crucial control disk for the GoldenEye and detonates one of the weapons to cover their tracks. Bond is already on the case and eventually follows the bad guys to Cuba, where a giant dish for controlling the satellite is hidden under a lake, which is dramatically drained to reveal the dish and its antenna. Like most modern action films, all the high tech gadgetry and cleverness is abandoned for the finale, where the fate of the Earth is ultimately decided by a fistfight between our hero and the villain.

GoldenEye is admittedly not all that bad as an action flick, and the basic plot device is one of the best ones in any Bond film. A number of movies during the 1990s tried to use the concept of Russian weapons falling into the wrong hands after the Cold War, but none as innovatively as this one. The final fight between Bond and an ex-secret agent was filmed atop the Arecibo radio telescope in Puerto Rico—a site that was also featured in the Jodie Foster movie Contact. It’s a spectacular location for a fight scene, although remarkably stupid in terms of logic—it does not require a 300-meter dish to control a satellite in Earth orbit; ten meters is more than enough.

Now considering that most of the above movies had some pretty clever space elements, it would be neat if somebody stole them (okay, in Hollywood they don’t steal, they pay homage) and put them in a better movie. Maybe something where the hero travels to the former Soviet Union and “acquires” a derelict Buran space shuttle to fly into orbit to prevent the detonation of an electromagnetic pulse weapon.

Then again, how do we know that Bill Gates is not already planning this?


Dwayne Day meant to write this article in time for the premiere of Casino Royale. Unfortunately, at that moment he was tied up, hands and feet, hanging above a swimming pool full of great white sharks equipped with lasers.

Fortunately, he escaped.

He can be reached at [email protected].

Dwayne

FYI @RichardTheBruce,

While Mr. Day doesn't think much of Bond films, he does like one particular Bond Girl!! :))


....On this I can agree with my namesake.

RichardTheBruce

Why Couldn’t
Q Save Bond? No Time To Die’s
Science Explained

See the complete article here:

By Holly McFarlane | Published Jan 9, 2023

Q insists he can’t save James Bond at the end of No Time To Die, but is the danger of Project Heracles’ nanobots actually supported by science?

Project Heracles poses a significant threat to James Bond and the greater public in No Time To Die due to Q’s and MI6’s inability to reverse it, but the real-life science behind the weapon suggests Project Heracles is more complicated than meets the eye. No Time To Die famously shows the end of the line for James Bond, as his infection with the bioweapon Project Heracles leads to his demise. No Time To Die makes the stakes of Project Heracles’ leak and corruption clear, but the scale of the weapon poses the question of whether Project Heracles would be possible using real-life science.

When it comes to James Bond movies, some suspension of disbelief is required. However, Project Heracles exists on the border of what is and isn’t scientifically possible, making it harder to suspend that disbelief. While Project Heracles’ technology is rooted in real science, its precise scientific accuracy leaves something to be desired. The usage of nanotechnology in reality clashes with Project Heracles’ presentation in No Time To Die, casting doubt over if it can be reversible. Project Heracles’ dubious realism makes it ambiguous whether Q can't save Bond at the end of No Time To Die.

No Time To Die's DNA Nanobots Virus Explained
No Time To Die establishes the clear threat posed by Project Heracles, but fully understanding how the bioweapon works is not quite as simple. Project Heracles is a DNA-programmable nanobot bioweapon developed under the supervision of M. Project Heracles’ nanobots target a certain person for death in No Time To Die through their DNA but are harmless to any other person without that DNA. M claims Project Heracles is meant to save lives and eliminate collateral damage by ensuring a clean shot to the target, which is great in theory but becomes dark in practice if it ends up in the wrong hands, as it does in No Time To Die.

Although M has good intentions with Project Heracles, the nanobots’ intended purpose becomes warped when it is discovered that the scientist working on the project, Obruchev, is actually working for Safin and has reprogrammed the bioweapon. Whereas Project Heracles is intended to only pose a threat to the target, Obruchev modifies it for No Time To Die's Safin to kill anyone related to the target or someone who possesses certain traits. The broader targeting of Obruchev’s version of Project Heracles is how the nanobots can target Madeleine and Mathilde or eradicate the entirety of Spectre, making it incredibly dangerous in No Time To Die.

How Realistic & Scientifically Accurate Is No Time To Die's Virus?
Project Heracles’ nanobots are a huge threat in No Time To Die, but their scientific accuracy, and the possibility of such a weapon in real life, is a different story. The concept already requires a leap of faith to believe such a weapon would be sanctioned under a department head like No Time To Die's M, given its potential to be corrupted. However, one aspect of Project Heracles that doesn’t require a suspension of disbelief is its basis in science, which exists in reality, even if it's not entirely accurate.

Nanotechnology similar to what is represented in Project Heracles does exist, although it is used to fight certain ailments on a molecular level rather than for targeted killing of people like in No Time To Die. However, this is a field of medicine that is still developing and improving. With that in mind, Project Heracles is accurate in its conception being rooted in real-life science, but that is where its realism ends.

Beyond whether the creation of such a weapon would occur, using nanobots to target people with certain DNA on the scale of what Safin does in No Time To Die with Project Heracles is not currently realistic. For Project Heracles to work, it would require a perfect understanding of DNA and nanotechnology, which isn’t yet possible. Additionally, the nanobot virus is shown to be fast-acting, which would take several hours in actuality. Perhaps a bioweapon like Project Heracles could exist in the future, but it would not be able to work on the scale shown using current scientific understanding and capabilities, making its depiction in No Time To Die inaccurate.

Why Couldn't Q Save Bond (Can Nanobots Be Removed)?
Although Project Heracles poses no actual threat to James Bond when he is infected by Safin in No Time To Die, Q claims there is nothing he can do to help him. When Daniel Craig's 007 asks Q how someone can rid themselves of Project Heracles after coming into contact with it, Q says there is nothing that can be done, as it is “permanent” and “eternal.” This explains why it is so threatening and needs to be destroyed. Because of Q’s insistence that Project Heracles is irreversible, Bond decides to remain on the island and sacrifice himself rather than pose a threat to Madeleine and Mathilde.

Despite Q’s insistence nothing can be done to help 007, this might not actually be the case. Though No Time To Die claims that Project Heracles is permanent, real-life nanotechnology can be removed or decommissioned. The body can eliminate 90% of nanoparticles, so, assuming Bond doesn't come into contact with the targets in No Time To Die's Madeleine and Mathilde, it might be possible with Project Heracles. Additionally, in the case of a malfunction/failure with nanotechnology, nanobots can be deactivated using an EMP or MRI, which short-circuits them and corrupts their memory. Given the fail-safes for nanotechnology, this method of decommissioning might have worked for Project Heracles.

Since Project Heracles poses no threat to James Bond, Q might have been able to save Bond using real-world fail-safes for nanotechnology. Given his profession and employer, Bond would have access to some of the most advanced technology and greatest minds to treat him. Despite not being dangerous for Bond, though, decommissioning his strain of Project Heracles would require separation from Madeleine in No Time To Die, something Bond can't do. In the end, Bond’s reluctance to be separated from his targeted loved ones and desire to keep them safe is why Q can't save Bond in No Time To Die, even if science suggests he can.

About The Author
Holly McFarlane (90 Articles Published)
Holly McFarlane has been a Movie/TV Features writer for Screen Rant since June 2022. She is currently based in Wisconsin, USA. A recent graduate of University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, she has a Bachelor's degree in English and Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. She has a deep love for critical analysis and social justice as well as a lifelong love for visual media and music, which are focuses that she likes implementing in her writing. Holly likes consuming a variety of types of media, although she adores sitcoms, Mad Men, Indiana Jones, and S

RichardTheBruce

The 007 saga gets a tech upgrade for the 2020s

See the complete article here:

https://cosmiclog.com/2023/04/10/the-007-saga-gets-a-tech-upgrade-for-the-2020s/#clubclub

By Alan Boyle
April 10, 2023

Kim Sherwood, author of "Double or Nothing," in an Alpine A110S sports car

Kim Sherwood checks out the driver's seat of the Alpine A110S sports car favored by her fictional Agent 003. (Photo by Rosie Sherwood)

Imagine a James Bond story with quantum computers, brain-computer interfaces, a cloud-shifting climate control system and a billionaire who owns his own launch system and satellite constellation.

Now imagine that James Bond is missing from the story.

That’s the unconventional tack taken by British author Kim Sherwood in her first-ever spy thriller, “Double or Nothing” — the kickoff to a trilogy that introduces a new cast of secret agents, plus some old favorites including M, Miss Moneypenny and CIA agent Felix Leiter.

James Bond, a.k.a. Agent 007, made his debut as the debonair MI6 spy 70 years ago in Ian Fleming’s first novel, Casino Royale, and went on to star in more than four dozen books and 27 movies. But “Double or Nothing” is not your grandparents’ 007 thriller.

“Ian Fleming, of course, was a product of his time, and I’m a product of mine,” Sherwood, a 33-year-old lecturer in creative writing at the University of Edinburgh, says in the latest episode of the Fiction Science podcast.
https://cosmiclog.com/category/fiction-science-club/

Sherwood has dreamed of writing James Bond novels since she was the age of 10, and she finally got her chance when she was chosen by Ian Fleming’s estate to update the 007 saga for a new generation.

Part of that task involved bringing more diversity to the traditionally white male cadre of secret agents in the James Bond universe.

“It was really exciting, this idea of developing new heroes, but also a challenge, of course,” Sherwood says. “If you’re writing a James Bond novel and you are asking readers to care about other characters, it’s a stretch — because it’s James Bond, you know. He’s an icon. He dominates the spotlight. If he’s there, he’s who you pay attention to.”

Sherwood’s solution was to leave Bond completely out of the picture.

“I thought I would work that challenge into the story itself, and have him missing from the beginning, and introduce these characters who care about him and are trying to find him. So he’s both absent and present,” she says.

One of the main characters is Johanna Harwood, Agent 003, who had a romantic relationship with Bond (and whose name pays tribute to a screenwriter who worked on the early 007 movies). Agent 004 is Joseph Dryden, a gay Black veteran of the war in Afghanistan. Agent 009 is Sid Bashir, a spy of British-Asian descent who was involved in a love triangle with Harwood and Bond.

Sherwood says the double-O diversity isn’t just a politically correct gimmick: “There’s also this idea in intelligence agencies called perspective blindness, where if everybody in your group comes from the same perspective, they’ll all miss the same clues, and they won’t challenge each other. So intelligence agencies in the last few decades have really sought to diversify their agents as a strategic asset.”

That’s not the only nod to modern times. “Double or Nothing” also features a dramatic update in 007’s tech world. The biggest change has to do with Q, who has traditionally been James Bond’s geeky gadget-meister. In Sherwood’s novel, Q is a quantum computer that sifts through terabytes of sensor data to anticipate the bad guys’ next moves.

“A lot of intelligence agencies are using quantum computing and artificial intelligence to crunch these massive data sets — things that would usually take hundreds of years for the human mind to work out,” Sherwood says. “But they’re using them for things like trolling through the financial records of terrorists.”

Sherwood says turning Q into a quantum computer was a no-brainer.

“When I found out that intelligence agencies were using quantum computing, I just thought, ‘Oh, Q, quantum, “Quantum of Solace” — I can’t resist this. It has to go in the book,'” she says. “And the Flemings are really happy with it, because they felt like this is the way that spy agencies are going.”

Although Sherwood’s double-O agents have to deal with an international mercenary force that parallels Russia’s Wagner Group, the biggest threat they face in “Double or Nothing” comes from a billionaire’s scheme to manipulate the planet’s climate through geoengineering. Sherwood suspects that if Ian Fleming were alive today, he would have addressed the climate crisis as well.

“He wrote about the major concerns of his day, whether it was fear of communism or fear of the bomb, whether it was civil rights issues or changing gender politics,” she says. “He’s working out all of these issues through his stories. So I looked around and thought, what’s our biggest concern? And it felt to me like our biggest global concern, both existentially and practically, is the climate crisis.”

Intelligence agencies are concerned about climate as well — concerned enough to issue a report about the national security implications. “One of the things I found really intriguing in that report was this idea that rogue actors or states could use geoengineering to try and avert the climate crisis, but without global consensus and without really knowing how it would work out,” Sherwood says. (In 2021, a follow-up report projected increased risks to U.S. interests over the next 20 years.)

Sherwood asked a science-savvy friend to do a reality check on her fictional geoengineering scheme. “It was kind of worrying in a way, because they got back to me and said, yes, it can occur, and actually it could be much worse than you think,” she says. “So what I had done was a sort of watered-down version.”

She also talked to medical experts about the idea of giving Agent 004 a hearing aid that doubles as a brain-computer interface connected to Q. “They said, yes, that’s basically what’s going to happen — and they talked me through how a kind of neural link might be made between the human mind and a quantum computer, which I ended up using in the book,” Sherwood says.

Yet another tech twist was inspired by the multibillion-dollar space efforts created by the likes of Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson. The billionaire in “Double or Nothing” controls a satellite network like SpaceX’s Starlink or Amazon’s Project Kuiper, as well as an air-launch system like the one pioneered with Branson’s backing at Virgin Orbit (which filed for bankruptcy last week).

Sherwood is intrigued by the mindset of today’s billionaires.

“Do they not see themselves as part of humanity? Do they imagine that on their private island or on their spaceship, they’ll somehow be safe?” she says. “I wish I could ask someone in this position how they rationalize it to themselves.”

Throughout the book, Sherwood works in subtler details that acknowledge how much society has evolved since Casino Royale came out in 1953. For example, Ms. Moneypenny is in charge of the double-O agents after what Sherwood calls “the world’s most overdue promotion” — and she drives a Jaguar sports car that’s been turned into an electric vehicle.

Will James Bond evolve as well? Or will he always be the martini-sipping spy with a penchant for bedding beautiful women?

“If there’s no martini, there’s no James Bond,” Sherwood says with a laugh. “For me, the really fun challenge of making this set in the present day was to take the essence of the character that we love, and to work out how you make this person psychologically viable today.”

In other words, stay tuned for the sequels.

]

“Double or Nothing” is the first book of a trilogy by Kim Sherwood.
(William Morrow / Harper Collins)

RichardTheBruce

This Plastic Is Straight Out of a James Bond Movie, It Self-
Destructs After Use

https://www.syfy.com/syfy-wire/straight-out-of-a-bond-movie-plastic-self-destructs-after-use
Obviously, Q had a hand in all this.
By Cassidy Ward May 16, 2024, 3:37 PM ET
No Public URLs
There are no public URLs for this media.

The 2021 spy caper No Time to Die (streaming now on Peacock) was the 25th installment in the James Bond franchise, starring Daniel Craig in the titular role. Like most Bond flicks, this one features a collection of fancy gadgets, courtesy of MI6’s resident techno-wizard, Q.

Over the years, Q has kept Bond and friends stocked with every gadget and gizmo they could ever want, and then some. They’ve had access to a bagpipe flamethrower, submersible cars, knife shoes, and explosive toothpaste, just to name a few. In the 1962 film Dr. No, the first onscreen incarnation of the franchise, Bond receives a set of papers in a “self-destructor bag.”

That idea of covert communications has become a trope of spy stories, with technologies like disappearing ink and messages which self-destruct a few seconds after they’ve been played. Now, researchers at the University of California, San Diego have created a plastic that would make James Bond proud by self-destructing after use.

Plastic Embedded with Bacterial Spores Consumes Itself After Use
A study recently published in the journal Nature Communications outlines a method by which U.C. San Diego researchers created plastics that eat themselves when we’re done with them. They started with pellets of thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) and spores from the bacterium Bacillus subtilis. TPU is soft, durable, and commonly used in everything from shoes to mattresses; B. subtilis is a bacterium which is more than happy to gobble up plastic polymers.

“It’s an inherent property of these bacteria. We took a few strains and evaluated their ability to use TPUs as a sole carbon source, then picked the one that grew the best,” said Jon Pokorski, co-lead author of the new study.

Strips of plain TPU (top) and "living" TPU (bottom) at different stages of decomposition over five months of being in compost. Photo: David Baillot/UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering

Bacterial spores were chosen because they are dormant and resistant to harsh conditions like those experienced during the production of plastics. Once researchers found sufficiently hungry bacteria, they set about breeding them to withstand the high temperatures of plastic production.

“We continually evolved the cells over and over again until we arrived at a strain that is optimized to tolerate the heat. It’s amazing how well this process of bacterial evolution and selection worked for this purpose,” said study co-author Adam Feist.

Plastic pellets and B. subtilis spores were fed into an extruder, melted together, and spit out in thin strips of bacterially impregnated plastic. In laboratory tests, the spores added strength, like rebar supports inside concrete, allowing it to be both stronger and more stretchy. They remain inside the plastic, dormant while the plastic is in use, and wake up only after it's been thrown away. Once the plastic hits the garbage dump, water and nutrients commonly found in compost activate the spores and they get busy eating the plastic.

Over the course of five months exposed to compost conditions, roughly 90% of the plastic had been consumed, while regular TPU in the same conditions had barely broken down at all. Researchers note that B. subtilis is generally regarded as safe to humans and animals, but more research is needed to identify any unknown downstream consequences. Future work will also attempt to expand the technology to other types of plastic.

If these new self-consuming plastics get to market, we’ll be able to toss our garbage with a little less guilt, safe in the knowledge that this water bottle will self-destruct.

In the meantime, catch No Time to Die, streaming now on Peacock.

RichardTheBruce

James Bond’s Jetpack
Escape in ‘Thunderball’
Almost Didn’t Happen

See complete article here:
https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/james-bond-thunderball-jetpack

At least not as initially planned.
by Jennifer Byrne April 25, 2024

In Terence Young's 1965 Thunderball, James Bond (played by Sean Connery) makes a quick getaway using a futuristic jetpack.

It’s May 1964, and a nervous energy permeates the air on the set of Thunderball, the fourth James Bond film starring Sean Connery. Soon enough, this jittery anticipation won’t be the only thing in the air.

Standing on the roofline of a French chateau, stuntman Bill Suitor is about to use a state-of-the-art jetpack to propel himself 20 feet into the sky.

Today, this same jetpack, the Bell Rocket Belt, is on display at the Museum of Science and Industry’s exhibition, 007 Science: Inventing the World of James Bond. The exhibition, which runs through October 27, 2024, celebrates Bond’s ultramodern gizmos from the legendary film franchise.

Technology tends to figure prominently in Bond’s fast-paced world of espionage. Just as the franchise is known for introducing Oscar-winning theme songs and glamorous new “Bond girls,” the films also have a reputation for predicting future tech.

The developers of the Bell Rocket Belt, Bell Aerosystems, had originally designed the jetpack in the 1960s as a tactical rescue vehicle for the U.S. Army. However, soldiers never used the Bell Rocket Belt due to its limited fuel storage and flight time. In 1965, the belt only had a 21-second maximum flight duration and a range of 393 feet. It was an intriguing idea with a flawed execution.

Although it wasn’t deemed military-grade, the Bell Rocket Belt opened up a new world to the future stuntman Bill Suitor. “Bill Suitor was an ordinary 19-year-old in 1964 when he mowed the lawn of Rocket Belt inventor Wendell Moore and put himself forward as a test pilot for the Rocket Belt in development with Bell Aerosystems,” says Meg Simmonds, archive director at Eon Productions, the U.K.-based production company that makes the James Bond films.

Suitor would pilot more than 1,000 flights with the Rocket Belt, including a demonstration in the opening ceremonies of the 1984 Olympic games. But perhaps the defining moment of Suitor’s career came when his job as a test pilot intersected with 007.

James Bond’s Thunderball jetpack, a.k.a. the Bell Rocket Belt, is currently on display at Chicago’s Museum of Science and Industry until October 27, 2024. Museum of Science and Industry

“Bond production designer Ken Adam thought [the jetpack] was just the type of gadget that Q Branch would issue James Bond,” says Simmonds.”

For the pre-title sequence in Thunderball, Connery’s Bond must kill Jacques Bouvar, an operative of the Special Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, and Extortion (often abbreviated to S.P.E.C.T.R.E.). After killing the disguised Bouvar, Bond makes a hasty escape via jetpack.

To film the sequence, director Terence Young combined close-ups of Connery shot against a rear projection screen using a replica jetpack with long shots of Suitor actually piloting the jetpack.

Bond’s hurried getaway wasn’t merely a plot device. According to Robert Godwin, founder of Apogee Books, which published Suitor’s book, Rocketbelt Pilot’s Manual: A Guide by the Bell Test Pilot, Suitor sometimes joked that if a pilot was still 20 feet off the ground when the jetpack exhausted its 21 seconds’ worth of fuel, they were “going to have a bad day.”

“Eventually, they started putting an egg timer on the pilot’s wrist, which would go off at 20 seconds so they knew they had to get down,” says Godwin. “But pilots couldn’t hear the egg timer ringing over the jetpack. So, they replaced it with a vibrating device at the nape of the neck, which would start pounding your skull to tell you to get down.”

Even after a fight to the death and with seconds to escape, the filmmakers wanted Bond to look cool and well-coiffed flying the jetpack.

Fortunately, Suitor didn’t encounter any “bad day” problems on the set of Thunderball. Initially, the filmmakers were far more concerned with bad hair days. Even after a fight to the death and with seconds to escape, they wanted Bond to look cool and well-coiffed flying the jetpack helmet-free.

But, Suitor, who valued his head more than Bond’s meticulous side-part, arrived on set and donned his safety helmet. “The assistant director explained they had already filmed Connery without a helmet, so they tried painting the helmet brown to match Connery’s hair, but it didn’t look right,” says Bond archivist Meg Simmonds. “So, the whole production team, including Connery, had to reconvene to film Connery putting on a helmet to match what they shot with Suitor.”

The scene, shot at Chateau d’Anet just northwest of Paris, went well—but that helmet probably was a smart idea. “Suitor flew from the top of the chateau to the ground a few times—once bouncing backwards about four feet on landing,” says Simmonds, “but all flights were successful and all under the time limit of 21 seconds.”

Kathleen McCarthy, director of collections and head curator at the Museum of Science and Industry, says the Bell Rocket Belt, which is on loan to the museum from the University of Buffalo, has not undergone restoration for the “007 Science” exhibition. Unlike Bond, the jetpack flaunts its imperfections with a certain panache.

“It has all the beautiful scars of being used and operated,” McCarthy says. “It doesn’t look brand new, but it shows its history.”

Sean Connery feigns shoving a vanilla ice cream cone in retired Lt. Col. Charles Russhon’s face on set during Thunderball. Russhon was the military adviser to the Bond films in the 1960s and 1970s and eventually became friends with Connery. Christian Russhon/Rachel Arroyo/Public Domain

In the exhibition, the Rocket Belt is displayed alongside a modern, commercially available jet suit from Gravity Industries, an intentional juxtaposition of Bond gadgetry with real-life, contemporary devices. The exhibition also includes Bond’s “suction cup climbers” from 1967’s You Only Live Twice contrasted with today’s Gecko Gloves.

“We’ve taken four Bond artifacts and paired them with contemporary technology to show that, while these items may have seemed like crazy ideas at the time, there were people out there developing these ideas,” says McCarthy. “Maybe it took a decade, maybe longer, but several of these items did eventually become a reality.”

The more modern iteration of jetpack technology that accompanies the Bell Rocket Belt, the Gravity Industries jet suit, is a fully functional device that can be purchased for about $400,000. The company also offers group flight experiences for $3,500.

“It’s a super cool fantasy—it plays into our age-old desire to fly like a bird,” says Daniel Levine, a trend expert who has studied jetpacks. “It’s different from being a passenger on a plane because with a jetpack you can have control and you can soar over the trees. That’s the ultimate dream. In fact, it’s a literal dream that a lot of people have.”

While the James Bond films have become known for debuting future technology, Levine acknowledges that the Jetsons-esque era in which we’re all rocketing to the office in our jetpacks has not yet arrived—and is unlikely to anytime soon.

Richard Browning, the founder of Gravity Industries, takes flight in his body-controlled jet-powered suit at Old Sarum Airfield in Salisbury, England. Andrew Lloyd/Alamy Stock

“I think the challenges are just too insurmountable for this to be adopted on a wide scale,” says Levine, citing drawbacks like “safety, energy efficiency, control, maneuverability, regulatory issues, and environmental impact.” He says, “It makes sense for very narrow purposes, and I think that’s what we’ll see [jetpacks] being used for even more in the future.”

Levine added that although he has witnessed some military use of jetpacks, the current generation of this technology might lack the necessary stealth to carry out a military operation.

“I’ve seen them flying from ship to ship in the Navy, and the military might be able to find certain other uses for them,” he says, “but at the moment, jetpacks with conventional fuels are quite loud. So, you’re not going to sneak anyone over a border or anything wearing a jetpack.”

As much as Levine admires and respects modern jetsuit technology, he admits he’s relieved they won’t likely become a widespread part of his daily commute.

“Luckily, it’s not going to happen,” he says. “I don’t want to see people flying right past my window all the time.”

DarthDimi

Great stuff, @RichardTheBruce! Thank you.

CommanderRoss

indeed!

RichardTheBruce

If luck is with me I'll see the display in person sometime in September at the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry .

RichardTheBruce

Is No Time to Die's
bioweapon plausible?

https://www.thenakedscientists.com/articles/interviews/no-time-dies-bioweapon-plausible
I'll have an action film superweapon. Scientifically analysed, not stirred.
04 April 2022
Interview with
Cassidy Ward

Part of the show Science of the Silver Screen
https://www.thenakedscientists.com/sites/default/files/media/podcasts/episodes/Naked_Scientists_Show_22.04.05_chap9-12.mp3


James Bond gun barrel
Credit: CC0, via Pixabay

The James Bond film, 'No Time to Die' centres around a bioweapon that can be tailored to an individual’s genetic makeup using nanomachines. It’s called ‘Project Heracles’. Harry Lewis interviews SYFY journalist and author, Cassidy Ward to look into if something like this would be realistic...

Cassidy - The short answer is no. We obviously do have bio weapons, they've been around for about as long as warfare has been a thing, but this sort of takes that to an extreme. We obviously also do have nanotech and we have gene editing capabilities. Heracles sort of imagines what we might be able to do if we had a perfect understanding of all of those fields and then put them to nefarious uses. Really, when it comes to bio weapons, this has absolutely been a concern for governments and for defence organizations for a while - since the genetic age started. It's not the most farfetched thing in the world. The reason perhaps that we don't have weapons like this is that they're really not necessary. We sadly have plenty of other ways to hurt one another.

Harry - You spoke about nanobots there, briefly. This is something that we actually use at the moment in day to day life is it?

Cassidy - Not so much in our day to day lives. The robots that we're likely to see in the day to day are much larger and don't have the sort of capabilities that we imagine in our future. The robots you're likely to encounter in the day to day are good at vacuuming your house or moving parts on a factory floor. In terms of medicine, nanobot tech is certainly improving. There was a recent paper published in the journal Science, for instance, where they used injectable nanofibers to promote and enhance healing in spinal injuries. That study was done in mice, but it was very promising. So that potential for nanobots and medicine is certainly there.

Harry - There's something that we see quite a lot of in the news: it's the idea of personalised medicine. In this, it's the use of how we tailor treatments and it's something that really becoming big at the moment to one's genetic disposition. This film sort of feels like it builds on that, but just following it down a different avenue, right?

Cassidy - Yeah, absolutely. Gene therapy is an emerging field of medicine, particularly for treating cancers and genetic diseases. The process involves identifying a target gene and then modifying it in some way. Depending on the specific circumstances, that might mean replacing a gene with a clean copy or turning it off altogether, or adding a new gene. Technologies like CRISPR have absolutely improved our ability to do that sort of work. Gene editing also allows us to create new therapies which have a wider audience than just one person. There was, for instance, a recent study involving spider silk proteins to modify a human protein called P53, which can put cancer cells into a sort of self destruct mode. So, yeah, 'No Time to Die', takes these capabilities and flips them on their head to ask the question, "What if we use genetic technologies for violence instead of for therapies?"

Harry - Cassidy, in something like James Bond, when we start to compare something that's real world, like with personalised medicine, and then you have something which speaks about personalised weaponry, is there a chance that this is harmful for people? We get a lot of science from our entertainment, right? And so, if we are crossing these wires, does that make it at all dangerous?

Cassidy - Science fiction in particular has the ability to imagine new futures. A lot of the time those prophecies become self-fulfilling. There's plenty of examples of not just technologies like space travel that were first dreamed up in science fiction before they were made realities, but scientists who get inspired from stories to get into the field. Really, we can only create a future if we can first imagine it and we probably should be careful about the sorts of futures that we imagine.

Harry - Yeah. It's a really interesting thought. In 'No Time to Die', he gets infected by the bio weapon and he is told by the supreme arch nemesis that it isn't reversible. If we were to be infected by a bio weapon, is there a chance that it wouldn't be reversible?

Cassidy - This was honestly my biggest gripe with the movie first off. I think if the villain is telling you something, it's probably worthwhile to not take that at face value. But I think that this is where a lot of science and fiction falls apart. When there's a choice between accuracy and drama stories often lead toward drama. We're not given a lot of specifics about exactly how Heracles works, but I think it's reasonable to assume that something could have been done; that the bots weren't infecting Bond directly, they were sort of holding up in his body, waiting for their intended target. I also think it's likely that the bots would've degraded in his body over time, and Bond also had access to some of the most advanced technology and brilliant minds in the world. If anyone could have fixed it, it's probably Q. I think Bond was just being a little dramatic.

Harry - And just finally, if you had to give it a score, how scientifically accurate, albeit hypothetically, is project Heracles and James Bond's 'No Time to Die.'

Cassidy - If I were to put project Heracles in today's world, I'd have to give a five or a six. It's built on a foundation of real science, but it asks the audience to take some pretty big leaps of faith in the way that it works. If we push the timeline forward a little bit, that score very likely would go up. I don't think it's impossible, but I do think it's unlikely, which is great because this is probably one of those cases where we don't want life to imitate art.

RichardTheBruce

Science brings some
mind-bending James
Bond tech to life

This new potential military tech could be hiding in plain sight.

https://www.inverse.com/innovation/scientists-bring-mind-bending-james-bond-tech-to-life

Updated: Feb. 20, 2024
Originally Published: Aug. 10, 2021

Whether it’s Harry Potter’s invisibility cloak or James Bond’s vanishing Aston Martin in Die Another Day, invisibility has been a long-sought-after human dream. Why suffer through a painful dinner party when you could quite literally blend into the upholstery?

This vanishing trick is something that the animal kingdom, including chameleons and cuttlefish, have already mastered. However, developing the technology to pull off the same feat for humans has been much more challenging. That could soon be changing, though, thanks to a new camouflaging technology developed by material scientists in South Korea.

This technology could transform everything from stealthy military tech to disappearing buildings. What you see isn’t always as it seems.

Published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications, the researchers demonstrate how this technology can transform a soft robot into an artificial chameleon capable of changing its appearance in real-time to match its environment.

Seung Hwan Ko is a senior author on the paper and professor of mechanical engineering at Seoul National University. He tells Inverse that in the future, this technology could transform military technology as we know it.

“The first application will be military, [Such as] covert intel robots [or] ‘actively’ camouflaging military uniforms,” says Ko.

Camouflage on military uniforms today is “passive,” Ko explains, meaning the patterns cannot respond dynamically to their environment. Weaving the team’s new technology into these coats would mean that soldiers could actively blend into any new environment.

James Bond's vanishing Aston Martin in Die Another Day.

(Watch the full movie on Youtube.)

What’s new — In nature, camouflaging animals can hide in plain sight by contracting and contorting their skin to change the pigment displayed therein. As a natural “technology,” their color-changing skin is both efficient and compact. Achieving the same fidelity for biomimicking tech, however, is not so simple.

Like its animal counterpart, this soft robot chameleon can change color with its environment.

The more sensors, pixels, and flexibility you add to such biomimicking skins, the higher the complexity of the entire system. This makes the task “exceptionally challenging,” the authors write.

To get around this problem, Ko and colleagues introduced a new approach that relies on layers of compact color-changing ink displays, stacked nanowire heaters, and small color sensors to get the job done.

Stacked together like the pages of a book, Ko says this technology allows the “skin” to capture both the color and pattern of its surroundings and react in real-time.

Why it matters — Beyond military applications, Ko says this technology could also trickle down to everyday consumers, whether that be purchasing an invisible hoodie or designing a camouflaging house.

You’ll never feel over or underdressed again with clothes that can “changes its color and patterns according to your taste or environment,” Ko says.
robot chameleon camouflage

After sensing the color of its surroundings, this chameleon robot can change the color of its skin using heat.
Seung Hwan Ko

How it works — In honor of this technology’s animal inspiration, the team designed a tethered chameleon robot to demonstrate how uses for their new skins. The first step, says Ko, is for the skin to acquire information about the color of its environment through color sensors.

Ko says they chose to use just color sensors instead of full vision sensors, eliminating extra bulk for the robot.

Once sure of its surroundings, the color sensors then transfer this information to the skin, where heat is adjusted throughout to change which colors are displayed — kind of like how mood rings are supposed to change color based on your body heat. While this technique works best on monochromatic surfaces, Ko says it’s also capable of matching patterns as well thanks to built-in multi-layered skin patterns.

That said, the skin is still far from perfect. One big obstacle the team worked to overcome was keeping external temperature — like snow on a cold day — from changing the skin's temperature, and thus the color. The team found that applying feedback controllers could help regulate these temperature spikes or dips.

What’s next — Ko says the team isn’t satisfied with these successes and has big plans to take their technology beyond a teetering, robot chameleon. Including integrating A.I.

“We are planning to explore an untethered and fully autonomous chameleon robot,” says Ko.

“We [also] plan to conduct follow-up research on an artificial intelligence-based sensing system that detects not only color but also patterns of various surrounding backgrounds. Through this, we could develop a more advanced artificial camouflage system.”

Abstract: Development of an artificial camouflage at a complete device level remains a vastly challenging task, especially under the aim of achieving more advanced and natural camouflage characteristics via high-resolution camouflage patterns. Our strategy is to integrate a thermochromic liquid crystal layer with the vertically stacked, patterned silver nanowire heaters in a multilayer structure to overcome the limitations of the conventional lateral pixelated scheme through the superposition of the heater-induced temperature profiles. At the same time, the weaknesses of thermochromic camouflage schemes are resolved in this study by utilizing the temperature-dependent resistance of the silver nanowire network as the process variable of the active control system. Combined with the active control system and sensing units, the complete device chameleon model successfully retrieves the local background color and matches its surface color instantaneously with natural transition characteristics to be a competent option for a next-generation artificial camouflage.

This article was originally published on Aug. 10, 2021

CommanderRoss

Would be interesting to see where they stand now. Ukrainian soldiers apparently have already been using invisibility cloaks in the battlefield.

RichardTheBruce

Yeah the Ukraine cloaking is actually to mask thermal imaging and that type detection. Different than invisibility.

Not a very dashing look. I expect Q Branch could serve it up in a solid black ninja style.


https://www.businessinsider.com/ukraine-claims-invented-invisibility-cloak-snipers-russia-war-2023-10

CommanderRoss

RichardTheBruce wrote: »

Yeah the Ukraine cloaking is actually to mask thermal imaging and that type detection. Different than invisibility.

Not a very dashing look. I expect Q Branch could serve it up in a solid black ninja style.


https://www.businessinsider.com/ukraine-claims-invented-invisibility-cloak-snipers-russia-war-2023-10

Ah, I thought it was more something like this:

RichardTheBruce

And conversely would the invisibility cloaks have a heat signature failing?

Carefully employed I guess.

RichardTheBruce

James Bond And The Science Of
Fiction

In many Bond movies, 007’s mind-blowing timepieces save the day. But are they really so far-fetched?
https://robbreport.com.au/watches/james-bond-and-the-science-of-fiction/
By Rob Ryan 09/11/2021

There have been many characters over the years touted as the “real-life” James Bond, a list usually drawn from the various spies and adventurers that his creator, Ian Fleming, met during his time in Naval Intelligence during WWII. Equally, there are several contenders for being the inspiration behind Q, the boffin who heads up Q (for Quartermaster) Branch – Fleming’s fictitious version of what is now known as Her Majesty’s Government Communications Centre – the department that provides 007 with his famous gadgets.

My favourite of these candidates for the prototype Q is Christopher Clayton Hutton, of the little-known branch of military intelligence called MI9. Its role in WWII was to help downed aircrew and escaped prisoners of war get back to the UK, using a series of escape lines across Europe, and Hutton’s job was to provide the equipment to assist in what was known as Escape and Evasion, a phrase which accurately describes much of Bond’s activity during a mission. So Clutty, as he was known, created maps concealed in playing cards; compasses hidden in buttons or collar studs; powerful flashlights disguised as bicycle pumps; multi-function ‘escape knives’, tiny radios and a cigarette lighter with a concealed camera inside.

The Aston Martin DB10 revealed to James Bond (Daniel Craig) in Q’s Workshop with Q (Ben Whishaw) in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures/Columbia Pictures/EON Productions’ action adventure SPECTRE.

Miniaturisation was his speciality and he would have relished the world of Bond, where various aids to Escape and Evasion have to be incorporated into equipment such as 007’s trusty Omega watches. But could even a maverick genius like Clutty make the spy’s various Seamasters function as shown on screen, or are they just a fantasy product of the scriptwriters’ imagination? With an Omega about to play a pivotal role in No Time To Die, it’s as good a moment as any to look at the practicality of the world’s most versatile, and sometimes lethal, timepiece, and to give them a ‘Clutty Rating’ (CR) for the likelihood of the great gadget man being able to duplicate them.

RADIO SIGNAL DETONATOR
Over the past 25 years, Bond has frequently turned to his Omega to get him out of a tight spot by making something explode. In GoldenEye (1995), 007 uses the Seamaster’s HRV (Helium Release Valve) to initiate the timing sequence on several limpet mines. This is the watch acting as an on-off switch for the mines – which means Q has installed an actuating transmitter in the Seamaster. The limpets never actually blow – spoilsport Alex Trevelyan (Sean Bean) uses another click on the HRV to stop the countdown.

All this is eminently feasible, even with the limited space within an Omega. Researchers at Columbia University in the U.S., for instance, have built what they describe as the smallest frequency-modulated (FM) radio transmitter ever. Based on a graphene nanoelectromechanical system (NEMS), the microscopic device oscillates at a frequency of 100 MHz and, with a tiny antenna, could broadcast an activation signal. Even without using nanotechnology, traditional UHF transmitters can now be produced that are not much longer than a grain of rice.

No matter what type of signal generator Q opts for, a battery needs to be included to provide the power for the transmission. But this is also achievable – the University of California is working on gold nanowire batteries, which use rechargeable filaments thinner than a human hair as an energy sink. More practically, the Jenax company has created a thin, foldable and bendable lithium-ion battery called J.Flex. It isn’t difficult to envisage one of the latter fitting snugly against the inside of the caseback of a Q Branch Seamaster.

CR: 9/10

THE LASER BEAM
Lasers have a long association with James Bond, ever since Goldfinger (1964), when 007 was “expected to die” while being threatened with being split in two by a giant industrial CO2 laser.

By the time of GoldenEye (1995), the laser had shrunk enough to be concealed in 007’s Omega Seamaster. Bond uses the light beam to cut a very neat panel out of the steel floor of rogue 00 agent Alex Trevelyan’s armoured train and escape before the whole lot blows. The laser-watch reappears in Die Another Day (2002), with the light lance emerging from the crown, operated by pressing the face of the Omega, and is deployed by 007 to cut a hole in the ice outside of Gustave Graves’ frozen palace (admittedly an easier task than burning through metal floors).

Ridiculous? Well, German prop-maker and ‘laser hobbyist’ Patrick Priebe has succeeded in fitting a 1,500 milliwatt laser into a wrist-worn case. The beam is capable of puncturing balloons, scorching walls and cutting through duct tape. Burning steel?

Not so much. You need at least 300 watts to cut metal. However, it will ignite matches, and it doesn’t take much to imagine a Bond scenario where that would come in handy. Like 007’s version, Priebe’s laser-watch also tells the time – using a very crude LED digital display. A handsome Seamaster it is not. Despite companies such as Boeing and Lockheed Martin working hard on miniaturising laser guidance and weapons systems, and the development of tiny (but weak) nano-lasers, it is likely that this is one 007 gadget that will remain in the realm of fiction for the time being.
CR: 2/10

PRIMARY EXPLOSIVE DETONATOR
In the pre-credits sequence of Die Another Day (2002), 007 lifts a tray of diamonds from an attaché case and underneath are blocks of C-4 explosive. He removes the Seamaster’s HRV, which has a small shaft or pin attached to it, and sticks this into the C-4. So what is it? I turned to Warrant Officer Kim Hughes, an ATO (Ammunition Technical Officer, bomb disposal expert in non-army parlance), who won the George Cross for his service in Afghanistan, to explain.

“Military grade explosives such as Semtex or C-4 are relatively insensitive compounds. They need a ‘kick’ to enable the chemical reaction to take place, which results in a rapid release of energy or explosion.”

So the detonator pin that Bond buries in the C-4 would contain a small amount of ‘primary’ explosive, triggered by heat from an electrical circuit. In the film, Bond initiates the blast by twisting the Omega’s bezel, which would send a signal to the HRV pin, causing a current to flow to a small wire. This instantly turns white-hot (think incandescent light bulbs) setting off the detonator charge, which in turn gives the energetic shock needed to make the main lump of C-4 go up. Is it realistic? Hughes agrees the principle is sound enough.
CR: 8/10

https://robbreport.com.au/application/assets/2021/11/Boss-Hunting_1-4.jpg
James Bond (Daniel Craig) in NO TIME TO DIE, an EON Productions and Metro Goldwyn Mayer Studios film Credit: Nicola Dove © 2020 DANJAQ, LLC AND MGM. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

PRIMARY AND SECONDARY CHARGE
An example of 007’s watch containing both primary detonator and secondary explosive is found in Tomorrow Never Dies (1997), which also features an X-ray of the Seamaster in the credits, showing its elegant inner workings in all its mechanical glory.

On board the megalomaniac media tycoon Elliot Carver’s stealth ship, Bond slides a small, flat unit from the side of his watch. This has a coin-sized explosive charge at its centre, with a detonator contained in the outer casing.

Bond assembles an IED – Improvised Explosive Device – by placing a hand grenade, with the pin removed, in a glass jar. The fit is tight enough to stop the safety handle of the grenade flying off. Bond tapes the portable micro-bomb to the jar. Later on, Bond transmits a signal, using the Omega’s bezel, to the unit.

The small amount of plastic explosive in the gizmo is just enough to shatter glass, so the jar breaks open. This allows the grenade handle to release, causing a conflagration that ignites the drums of flammable liquid that all super-villains carelessly leave lying around. Simple.
CR: 9/10

THE GRAPPLING HOOK
A grappling hook and cable fired from a pistol appeared in the opening sequence of GoldenEye during the dam dive, but by The World Is Not Enough (1999), the device was incorporated into Bond’s Omega (along with ultra-bright micro-LEDs which provide illumination when Bond is stuck inside an inflatable anti-avalanche sphere). This piton system really would have been a challenge to Q Branch. But as ATO Kim Hughes pointed out to me, there is already a weapon that fires hooks trailing a cable: the taser.

Tasers use compressed gas to deploy the lines down which the electric shock travels, but shrinking the cylinders enough to fit into a Seamaster is quite an undertaking. However, ultracompact micro-and pico-cylinders do exist and are used in medicine in self-injection devices and inhalers. Whether they would generate enough pressure to drive a piton in concrete, however, is doubtful.

The BolaWrap100 uses a blank .380 cartridge as a propellant and the tether exits the weapon at 200m a second, faster than the human eye can see clearly. The drawback for Bond and his Omega? The BolaWrap is the size of a mobile phone. Something tinier is needed. Enter the ANT, or actuating nano-transducer, which releases remarkable amounts of energy from gold particles which fly apart when hit by a beam from a miniscule nano-laser.

“It’s like an explosion,” said Dr Tao Ding from Cambridge’s Cavendish Laboratory. “We have hundreds of gold balls flying apart in a millionth of a second when water molecules inflate the polymers around them.” Such an explosion could be used to propel out the barb, while the same technology could be harnessed to produce an ANT “engine” to power the rotating bezel that rewinds the line attached to the hook.

And the cable needed to support the weight of 007? A 2020 update on the Omega would not use high-tensile steel (too bulky to incorporate in the watch) but rather a new material, such as Dyneema (15 times stronger than steel) – or perhaps one of the materials that laboratories are currently experimenting with, such as a filament that mimic the properties of spider silk in terms of tensile strength. The US Army, for example, is testing fibres called ‘Dragon Silk’, produced from modified silkworms, which are strong enough to be woven into bulletproof vests.
CR: 3/10

Daniel Craig stars as James Bond in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures/Columbia Pictures/EON Productions action adventure SKYFALL.

PRIMARY EXPLOSIVE
The Q Branch Omega watches were retired from active duty (other than for telling the time) for the first run of the Daniel Craig movies, but in Spectre (2015) one watch was up to its old tricks. When he is tortured by Blofeld, Bond manages to remove his NATO-strapped Seamaster and spins the crown, so that the hour markers flash red. This initiates a countdown that culminates in a blast that blows Blofeld off his chair and causes significant facial damage to the villain.

Kim Hughes pointed out that it would be difficult to pack enough explosive into the Spectre watch to cause such a big bang.

However, he did concede that modern hard PBX (Plastic Bonded Explosive) could be machined or cast – complete with engraving – to replace entirely the caseback of the Seamaster (it would, he adds, also need a detonator and a battery to be fully operational).

He reckoned this might be enough to, say, blow off a hand. Whether one would want to walk around all day wearing such a timepiece is debatable. Of course, he is assuming that Q wouldn’t have access to types of PBX more powerful than those commercially available.
CR: 6/10

AND FOR ITS NEXT TRICK?
A lightweight titanium Omega Seamaster Diver 300M chronometer will certainly play a part in the next 007 outing, No Time To Die. Rumour has it that Q Branch has been hard at work creating new surprises to incorporate into Bond’s trusty timepiece. For the moment, exactly what those surprises are is under wraps. Time will tell.

The latest James Bond adventure, No Time To Die, is out in cinemas Thursday, November 11. 007.com

Technology
J.Flex, A Lithium-Ion Battery That Is Flexible

18 February, 20203.754

https://www.electronics-lab.com/j-flex-lithium-ion-battery-flexible/
A Busan-based company has been developing J.Flex, an advanced lithium-ion battery that is ultra-thin, flexible, and rechargeable for the past few years now. The company used terms like bend, roll, twist, scrunch, fold, flex to describe the battery. EJ Shin, head of strategic planning at Jenax says:

“What we’re doing at Jenax is putting batteries into locations where they couldn’t be before.” She goes on “we’re now interacting with machines on a different level from what we did before,”

RichardTheBruce

Health
The Anatomical Quirk
That Saved Dr. No

A wild tale of how scientists unraveled embryology’s most fascinating mystery.
By John Wallingford October 11, 2024
https://nautil.us/the-anatomical-quirk-that-saved-dr-no-951705/

Julius No came up tough. Abandoned by his parents, he fell in with criminals—and eventually it caught up with him. One night, an assassin aimed carefully at his chest, just left of center, and shot him through the heart. Or so he thought. But Julius didn’t die. He went on to medical school, and became an early nemesis of a certain spy named James Bond. Dr. No is a fascinating character, but what surely escapes most fans of Ian Fleming’s novels is that the villain’s miraculous survival reveals a facet of human anatomy that usually remains hidden—a radical asymmetry of left and right.

The difference between our front and back is so obvious that we rarely think about it; we simply don’t have eyes in the back of our head. Top and bottom are obvious, too. Inside, though, asymmetry is everywhere. Heart and stomach lie to the left, the liver to the right. Even our lungs aren’t truly paired; the right lung has three lobes, the left two. And anyone who’s had appendicitis can tell you about the chirality of our guts. The searing abdominal pain radiates from the lower right, not the left.

It’s a story of sperm that can’t
swim, a young cardiology fellow,
and Japanese street food.

Dr. No survived because his assassin quite reasonably assumed the heart would lie to the left, but his victim was among the very tiny fraction of people who are born with their organs reversed, a mirror image called situs inversus. And while Dr. No is fictional, situs inversus did save the life of at least one real-world gunshot victim, described in a 2020 case study titled, “Shot in the Chest, Saved by the Heart.”

How our organs take on these asymmetrical positions is among the most fascinating questions in developmental biology, the science of embryos. The single cell of the fertilized egg divides again and again, becoming trillions, and those cells literally sculpt our bodies. The process by which this happens is almost implausibly baroque. I am a molecular biologist, and in my 30 years of studying embryos, I’ve found few things quite so fantastical as the tortuous route embryos take to separate right from left.

It’s fitting, then, that the story of how we came to understand these mysteries is equally tortuous. It’s not simply a story of developmental biology, but one of chronic coughing, sperm that can’t swim, a young cardiology fellow, and Japanese street food. Oddly enough, the story opens with another spy, and another doctor named Julius.

Unlike Mr. Bond, Privy Councillor Karl Ferdinand Zivert hadn’t a trace of cloak and dagger panache. It was the decidedly glamourless craft of reading other people’s mail that made him a favorite spy of the last emperor of Russia, Tsar Nicholas II. It also made Zivert rich enough to send a son to medical school, and in 1902, that son published a case report in Russkiy Vrach (The Russian Physician). In it, Alfons-Ferdinand Julius Zivert described just a single patient, a 21-year-old man who’d been coughing violently for his entire life.

The scene in the clinic will sound familiar. The doctor got out his stethoscope, placed it here and there, listened. Then he laid his hands on the patient’s chest and abdomen, pressing here and there, pausing thoughtfully. The routine seems perfunctory, but its remarkable diagnostic power has kept it a staple of medicine for 200 years. It also offers the rare opportunity to appreciate your own left and right.

TAKING SIDES: Heart and stomach lie to the left, the liver to the right. Even our lungs aren’t truly paired; the right lung has three lobes, the left two. And anyone who’s had appendicitis can tell you about the chirality of our guts. Image by sweet_tomato

Zivert hoped the sounds in his stethoscope would give up some hint to the nature of that persistent cough. But he didn’t hear what he expected; the lung sounds weren’t even in the right place. Nor were the heart sounds. Pressing gently, he felt for the liver; it too wasn’t where it should be. He listened again, finding the bowel sounds out of place as well. Right there in Kiev, decades before the advent of X-rays, it was entirely obvious that this patient had been born not just with a cough, but also with situs inversus.

Zivert wasn’t the first to observe the condition, so while situs inversus was interesting, it was the cough that fascinated him. Severe and constant, the patient had suffered violent spasms every day since his birth. Whatever was wrong with his lungs, Zivert was certain it had occurred during embryonic development, right alongside the reversal of his organs. In arguing that both the patient’s compromised lung function and left/right asymmetry arose during embryonic development, Zivert took a big step. To make sense of what happened next, though, we need first to consider something that happened long before.

In the late 17th century, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek’s innovations in microscopy made him the first to see what we now know is an entire world of microscopic organisms.

He had discovered impossibly small creatures in pond water and seawater, but the Dutch fabric merchant was aware of his outsider, even amateur, status. So, he hesitated before exploring another fluid. Did anyone really want him to look that closely at his own semen? Well, yes, actually, he decided, they did. And why stop there? He examined the semen of rabbits and dogs. He discovered there a new creature, one with a rounded head and a long tail that beat rhythmically. It swam!

Fearing the findings were obscene, he described them in Latin to lend a veneer of respectability. In 1677, he sent them to the president of the Royal Society of London, advising him “to publish or destroy them, as your Lordship sees fit.” His Lordship did publish them, and that is how the world learned about sperm.

But sperm weren’t the only tails van Leeuwenhoek saw wagging in his new microscopes. Other creatures too were “furnisht with similar instruments in order to make a stir in the water”—tiny aquatic animals studded with hair-like tails called cilia. In the early 19th century, we learned that those creatures with wagging tails includes us. The inside of our lungs and trachea are lined by millions of these cilia. And while they pulse just like sperm tails, the outcome is the opposite. Sperm tails propel the cell through a fluid, but airway cells stay put; cilia propel the fluid. What fluid, you ask? Mucus.

You’ve probably thought about mucus, at least when you’re sick, but while I think about cilia pretty much every day (it’s my job), you might never think of them at all. And yet, mucus and cilia form an inseparable partnership. Mucus is constantly produced in a thin layer, and the cilia beat without pause to move it to your pharynx, where you swallow it. All day and night, you are swallowing mucus, and this slimy treadmill is essential to the health of your lungs. It captures and removes inhaled particles, bacteria, and viruses. When your cilia don’t beat, mucus can’t move; it gets stuck in your lungs, and you cough. Worse yet, you can’t clear those pathogens, so you pretty much always have a cold, or worse, pneumonia. Just like Zivert’s patient in Kiev.

Young Zivert knew about the cilia in our lungs, but he hadn’t an inkling of how they relate to situs inversus. For decades, neither did anyone else, even as X-rays revealed a whole series of similar patients and forged an irrefutable link between situs inversus and lung disease. Then one day in Stockholm, medical scientist Bjorn Afzelius was asked to help figure out why some men’s sperm don’t swim.

Afzelius was a pioneer of the electron microscope, and like van Leeuwenhoek before him, he drew back the veil on a whole new world of sperm, seeing inside them for the first time. In 1959, Afzelius discovered repeated units inside their waving tails that he called “arms.” Within a few years, the same arms were found in all kinds of cilia, from van Leeuwenhoek’s tiny aquatic animals to those in our own airway, a remarkable testament to evolution at work. Today, we know these arms are composed of a molecular motor protein called dynein. Arrayed along the entire length of cilia, they drive the wagging of these extraordinary tails.

It was only natural that Afzelius was asked to examine the sperm of infertile men, for in many patients, sperm are present and look normal, but their tails don’t beat. Maybe some defect could be discerned in the electron microscope? Sure enough, his patients’ sperm lacked dynein arms.

It was a satisfying discovery, but it wouldn’t have made him famous but for the fact that three of the infertile men just kept coughing. Afzelius examined biopsies of their airway cilia, and these too lacked dynein arms. Inevitably, their coughing led to chest X-rays, and those in turn revealed that all three also had situs inversus. Afzelius knew this reversal was rare; it couldn’t be a coincidence. The waving of cilia must somehow be connected to the left/right asymmetry of the body.

Sperm weren’t the only tails van
Leeuwenhoek saw wagging in his
new microscopes.

Embryos develop progressively, starting simply and becoming more complex bit by bit, so the next big question was where and when in the embryo these still-hypothetical cilia did their thing. Afzelius found a clue in the library when he learned that just across the Baltic Sea in Rostock, Germany—but decades earlier—Kurt Pressler had been tinkering with toads. A practitioner of what is now called “cut and paste” embryology, he used watchmaker’s forceps and fine glass needles to dissect out bits of embryos and reimplant them to see how development might be affected. Afzelius was keen on a report from 1911, in which Pressler described the result of a surgery performed surprisingly early in embryogenesis, not just before organs become asymmetric, but before organs even become.

Embryos lay out their principal axes in a process called gastrulation, at the end of which an expert can discern front from back, head from tail. But at this early point, the embryo still has no organs; left and right exist only as geometry. Nonetheless, Pressler found that when a small part of the back was removed at this stage, rotated 180 degrees, and re-implanted, then some weeks later the organs developed with complete situs inversus.

Pressler said nothing of cilia, but Afzelius sensed the flow of evidence perfectly. Today, we know that motile cilia on that rotated bit of an early frog embryo do control left and right. Cilia in the equivalent region of early mammalian embryos, including humans, do the same. But Afzelius couldn’t prove it, and he complained that he couldn’t test his idea with “a more specific interference.”

Ironically, the very “interference” that ultimately proved Afzelius right had already been discovered, 15 years before his lament. He just didn’t know about it. This was long before the internet, and anyway, it hadn’t come from his colleagues studying male fertility, or from electron microscopists, or even from developmental biologists. No, that discovery came from an expert in breast cancer, a mouse geneticist in Bar Harbor, Maine.

Katherine Hummel was never particularly interested in situs inversus. When the double helix structure of DNA was discovered in the 1950s, she was well known for her studies of the genetic basis of cancer. Cancer runs in the family, not just in humans but in mice as well. Hummel had found such mouse families, and by reliably developing tumors, they allowed her to test treatments, to glean insights. And, in breeding generation upon generation of mice, she inevitably found new families, with new traits. Families of mice with diabetes, families prone to obesity. One day, she observed a litter of suckling pups, their nearly transparent newborn skin revealing tiny white stomachs filled with milk.

To her surprise, two of the pups had that white spot on the right, not the left. She bred the mice further and found that situs inversus was a genetic trait. It ran in the family. She also found that only a single gene was responsible, but with the revolution of molecular biology still decades away, she’d no idea which gene. Just the same, she dutifully published a paper describing the mice in 1959, the very year Afzelius had first found arms in cilia. Hummel never studied the mice again, though others did, and like some rodent royal bloodline, the family bred true for dozens of generations.

Inspiration arrived from two
unlikely sources: street food and the
oil industry.

In the 1990s, a new breed of “molecular geneticists” started to link such families of mice to specific genes. One of these was Martina Brueckner. Born the same year Hummel published her paper, Brueckner used the descendants of those two pups to add the next piece to Zivert and Afzelius’ growing puzzle.

The mouse genome has nearly 3 billion individual units, and Brueckner found the tiniest possible change. In the ATCG language of genes, changing a single G to an A in the DNA was enough to cripple the dynein motor in the arms; cilia in these mice cannot beat. Even more excitingly, she found that the gene is active specifically in a region of the early mouse embryo called the node, the anatomical equivalent of that rotated bit in Pressler’s toads.

Shigenori Nonaka read Brueckner’s paper closely. Half a world away in Japan, he was using video microscopy to make movies of this very region of the mouse embryo, the node. He saw cilia beating there, but more importantly, he was able to add tiny beads to the fluid around the embryo and track their motion. Like mucus marching toward the pharynx, the beads revealed a striking, robust flow across the node. And it was always from right to left. When he did the same with the mice with situs inversus, the beads didn’t move at all. But while it’s obvious enough how infertility results if sperm can’t swim, or that mucus accumulates if airway cilia don’t beat, it wasn’t at all obvious why or how flow of fluid across the node could cause left/right asymmetry. So, seeing the flow just wasn’t enough; Nonaka remembers his mentor insisting he find a way to change it.

Nonaka set aside the modern tools of molecular genetics and took up the century-old tools of cut-and-paste embryology. Using forceps and fine needles that Pressler would recognize, he carefully dissected early mouse embryos out of the uterus and away from the placenta. Just handling these tiny embryos, perhaps half a millimeter long, is hard enough. But getting them to stay still? And creating an equally tiny flow of fluid across them? It seemed impossible.

Inspiration arrived from two unlikely sources: Japanese street food and the oil industry. Takoyaki is a fried octopus treat popular near Osaka. To position his embryos, Nonaka “trapped” them using tiny closed-end chambers he crafted to resemble traditional octopus traps. The embryos were held in place with the ciliated node waving in the fluid outside. Then, after seeing a picture of devices that smooth the flow of oil through refineries, he fashioned a similar but miniscule pump to generate a smooth but tiny “stir in the water,” to borrow van Leeuwenhoek’s phrase from centuries before.

The contraption worked. Nonaka could precisely control fluid flow across the mouse node. When he drove it leftward, all of the embryos developed normally. When he reversed the flow, they developed situs inversus. Leftward flow, controlled by normal cilia with healthy arms, he reasoned, causes cells on the left side to turn on developmental genes that remain silent on the right.

For Dr. No, situs inversus was a blessing, but for most people it simply is: It makes little impact on a person’s health. One woman even became a minor celebrity, posthumously at least, when an autopsy found she’d lived 99 years without ever knowing her organs were reversed. It’s easy to imagine how. A British car with the steering wheel on the right seems strange to Americans, but it drives just fine. So, too, with our organs. Even flipped, if they are connected in the right way, their physiology is normal.

But there is a dark side to our left and right. Imagine a partial reversal, for example where the heart is flipped but the lungs and liver are not. How could the veins and arteries connecting them find their way in the embryo to the right part of each organ? The fact is, they often don’t. Situs inversus has long been linked to a risk for birth defects, especially those affecting the heart. Hummel noted them in her mice; Pressler’s toads had them, too.

MILKSPOTS: Martina Brueckner’s picture of two of Hummel’s mice. The white, milk-filled stomach (arrow) is normally positioned on the left side of the mouse on the left. It’s littermate on the right has situs inversus, it’s milkspot obvious on the right side of its body. Credit: Martina Brueckner.

Martina Brueckner knows this dark side all too well. She discovered that 1-in-3-billion genetic anomaly, but she didn’t set out to be a geneticist. She’s a pediatric cardiologist, and the kids in her ICU at Yale Medical School are often very, very sick.

When she was still a fellow, mice with situs inversus seemed a reasonable topic for a short, mandatory research project. But when she first set foot in a mouse colony, she saw those tiny milk-filled stomachs on the wrong side and was hooked. She didn’t stop with finding the gene in Hummel’s mice; she’s spent the last 25 years looking for and finding genes related to our own left and right. Sadly, these discoveries usually come from kids with heart defects.

And this work is important, because partial reversal of the organs (called heterotaxy is frequently lethal. Indeed, birth defects are the number one cause of death for babies in the United States, and more than twice as lethal as pediatric cancer for children of all ages. Heart defects are the most common among them, and while some are treatable with surgery, others are incurable.

Now, a host of studies launched by Brueckner, Nonaka, and others working with animal models is enabling us to find genetic variants—subtle ATCG changes like the one in Hummel’s mice—that cause heterotaxy in humans. With advances in human genomics and preimplantation genetic diagnosis, we’re starting to see a path forward to preventing not just congenital heart defects, but perhaps even the lifelong cough that Zivert’s patient suffered.

Back in Dr. No’s underwater lair, James Bond pours a third martini from the shaker. His host with the inverted anatomy parts his thin lips and recounts the aftermath of his brush with death. “I hid myself in the academic world,” he explains, “the world of libraries and laboratories. And there, Mr. Bond, I lost myself in the study of the human body and human mind. Why? Because I wished to know what this clay is capable of. I had to learn what my tools were before I put them to use.”

Absent the villainy, Zivert’s goals were the same. So, I wonder about him, and how he returned home that April day after seeing his coughing patient. He must have been puzzled. But could he imagine the convoluted epic of real-life libraries and laboratories that would follow? How slowly we’d learn what the clay is capable of?

Over dinner, James Bond considered his nemesis: “The incredible biography rang true. Not a word of it impossible.” Biology follows a similar script, one that’s incredible but true: What looks like no more than the slightest wiggle in an embryo commands the whole of an invisible axis inside the body and governs the function of the sperm, the lungs, and the heart.

John Wallingford is the Mr. and Mrs. Robert P. Doherty, Jr. Regents Chair in Molecular Biology at the University of Texas at Austin. He is a 2022 Guggenheim Fellow and a past president of the Society for Developmental Biology.