Oddball Tech: Floating mice (the animal, not the computer accessory)

Maybe one day we’ll be putting on our special mag-lev suits so we can float around and avoid walking all together. Why is that? Mice, which are quite biologically similar to humans, have been floated using magnetism recently.

In case you are thinking that scientists have way too much time and money on their hands, the research is geared towards helping NASA train astronauts in low gravity environments. The 10 gram mouse that was levitated, which I will name “Chester” (even though there is no mention of its name), was unhappy with being floated. Apparently, Chester tried to grab on to something, wound up kicking in the air, which caused him to spin around, which, in turn, made Chester more agitated.

Since no one wanted to see Chester irritated, he was sedated and when subsequently floated, Chester was fine with floating. Tests lasted for several hours and yielded results such that a mouse could become used to the low gravity environment and maintain its daily activities such as eating in this altered state. After NASA gets a hold of this technology and has it working well, I could see this entering amusement parks before we know it.

Source: [LiveScience]