Thoughts for implantable data storage
I've been looking on and off at this for awhile now and while I'm not sure it's something I want to try, I'd like to get some general feedback.
Suppose a person were to take one of these Sandisk Connect Wireless Sticks (and here's a manual for one for reference), tear it down to see if the size could be reduced at all (thickness could certainly be reduced by removing the outer case), swap out the power button with a reed switch, permanently connect an induction charging receiver into the (trimmed down) usb connection, and coat the whole thing in silicone (probably adding back all the thickness saved by removing the outer casing, sadly). The idea being that you'd have implantable wireless data storage with already existent support applications for mobile devices (iOS and Android) and PCs. Everything in a neat, nearly off-the-shelf package. I know that many people won't see a need for such a thing, but it is a thing I want regardless. 200 gigabytes of implanted storage. That's 40 more than Johnny Mnemonic and no need to dump any longterm memory to do it ;)
Where are the downfalls? Things that come to mind are:
Suppose a person were to take one of these Sandisk Connect Wireless Sticks (and here's a manual for one for reference), tear it down to see if the size could be reduced at all (thickness could certainly be reduced by removing the outer case), swap out the power button with a reed switch, permanently connect an induction charging receiver into the (trimmed down) usb connection, and coat the whole thing in silicone (probably adding back all the thickness saved by removing the outer casing, sadly). The idea being that you'd have implantable wireless data storage with already existent support applications for mobile devices (iOS and Android) and PCs. Everything in a neat, nearly off-the-shelf package. I know that many people won't see a need for such a thing, but it is a thing I want regardless. 200 gigabytes of implanted storage. That's 40 more than Johnny Mnemonic and no need to dump any longterm memory to do it ;)
Where are the downfalls? Things that come to mind are:
- The size is a little large. I know SftM implanted a thumb drive as a test at one point...
- The manual seems to imply that it needs a decent amount of power to charge (it will not charge if plugged into a usb cable and must be plugged directly into a port). So the induction would need to output enough mA to be close to USB. Would this get too hot? Would the coil need to be unreasonably large?
- How reliable are reed switches? Would a typical magnet implant be able to reliably trip the switch?
Comments
I have micro flash drives and wireless receivers for my Raspberry Pi, so even if we built one from scratch, it's going to be mostly power that will be the bigger issue. I don't know what kind of power would be required. Maybe we can find someone who could make micro batteries like these researchers did.
https://www.seas.harvard.edu/news/2013/06/printing-tiny-batteries
All that to say, I think it's completely possible, the only question is exactly how to do it.
As far as transdermal things go, that's exciting, but ultimately you still want everything to be wireless as having cords is inconvenient, less so with specially designed magnetic break-away cords, but still inconvenient.
On the topic of my implant idea based on SanDisk's drive, I had given thought to where to put it (implanted), and my best thought was in the sort of void space just behind the clavicle bone on either side of the neck, feel free to tell me if that's an awful idea, I haven't done much looking into what sorts of blood vessels or ligaments are in the immediate area. I figured, since there's a visible sort of "pit" formed whenever my shoulders aren't basically as far down as they go, surely the skin can stand having something extra there, basically my thought was that the implant would be too large to fit well in the tightly wrapped skin around an arm or even a thigh without being somewhat extremely sensitive.