Almost everyone has probably sent some regretful texts after late-night drinking. But a team of scientists recently sent the first message to be literally conveyed through alcohol.
Canadian and British researchers used sprays of vodka to send the message "O Canada" several feet through open space, CNET reported.
The first text sent through alcohol could be the next step to molecular communication, which could be used underwater, underground or in the human body, all places difficult to reach with electromagnetic waves.
As detailed in the journal PLOS ONE, the team from Warwick and York University in Toronto turned the simple message into binary signals, encoding the alphabet using one spray to represent 1 and no spray to represent zero.
Molecular communication has many examples in nature, such as bees that spray pheromones as a warning to others, calcium signaling in cells and quorum sensing in bacteria to develop drug resistance.
The researchers hope one day to be able to transmit continuous data.
"Imagine sending a detailed message using perfume--it sounds like something from a spy thriller novel, but in reality it is an incredibly simple way to communicate," Dr. Weisi Guo of the University of Warwick in the UK said in a school news release. "Of course people have achieved short-ranged signaling using chemicals, but we have gone to the next level and successfully communicated continuous and generic messages over several meters."
While molecular communication wouldn't replace electronic magnetic waves, it would be handy for certain situations. Nanomedicine is one example; if scientists could implement molecular communication into the mini robots and sensors they inject, antenna size would no longer be an issue.
The signals, which are biocompatible and use minimal energy, could be put to use in the near future, as the research team is already working to launch a company that could market the new technology.
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