Pac-man in a petri dish

Researchers from the Institute of Southeast Norway, led by Professor Eric Andrew Johannssen, presented the project “ Mikroskopisk Pacman ”. This is the physical equivalent of the game Pac-Man. A copy of the labyrinth from the world of the game Pac-Man with a size of less than a millimeter was placed in a favorable environment for microorganisms. Roles play the role of ghosts. The role of Pac-Man is assigned to Euglena Green (lat. Euglena viridis). According to the authors of the work, the labyrinth is much closer to the natural living conditions of protozoa and rotifers than ordinary Petri dishes . And the features of the relationship of hunters and their victims in this labyrinth reflect the real state of affairs.

According to Johannssen, an artificial two-dimensional environment is formed in Petri dishes, in which there are no obstacles, and microorganisms spread in any direction without restrictions. It is not possible to track the natural relationships of predators and preys in such conditions. Introducing an additional component in the form of a three-dimensional maze, experts forced the inhabitants to interact with the environment, and not just with each other. And the fact that this environment has taken the form of a maze from a popular game, according to scientists, will contribute to the popularization of science. The number of video views created by scientists is steadily increasing. It seems that scientists have achieved their goal.


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Initially rotifers moved reluctantly and slowly. But after only a day, having become accustomed, they began to actively move through this labyrinth. In the future, Norwegians plan to change the conditions of the habitat in the maze. For example, some areas of this habitat scientists will make more favorable for microorganisms.

Such experiments, although they do not have great scientific value, are very spectacular and attract attention to science and technology. It is from the videos with the adventures of their four-legged and two-legged robots that most people know the company Boston Dynamics. The company does not just shoot another novelty as it should, but cares about the “directing” of the clips: robots bring people beer and congratulate the audience on Christmas as Santa Claus.

Researchers at IBM research once made a whole cartoon with characters assembled from individual molecules. For 10 days, scientists manually (or rather, with the help of an electron microscope) drew a frame by frame of carbon monoxide molecules on a copper substrate - all in order to interest more people.