Add bacteria to the list of things that can run Doom From teletext to pregnancy tests and even tractors, Doom has long been a target of hackers trying to get the seminal 1993 shooter running in the strangest of places. But this one frags them all. In a somewhat groundbreaking yet bizarre scientific feat, MIT biotechnology PhD student researcher Lauren "Ren" Ramlan has coaxed a …
Next week, we'll have Doom playing using H-bomb explosions using above ground, below ground, undersea, etc. on a large scale pixel map on a spherical surface that can be viewed and played from the surface of the moon.
(we're having some problems with certain colors, but we'll fix them on the next planet)
Enough of this. I want to see the opposite. What's the most egregious example of misusing incredibly powerful, expensive, important and specialist hardware to run Doom?
Hijack the search for a cure for cancer. Jeapordise the lives of the ISS. Misuse your country's ballistic missile defence system.
Blow the ballistic missile defense mechanism.
Use individual MIRVs to illuminate pixels.
To economise on missiles, you can illuminate several neighbouring pixels by using a warhead with the yield turned all the way up, or turned all the way down for just one.
Frame rate should be as high as you want, but post the various SALT treaties, games will now be rather short.
Technically DOOM isn't running on the bacteria, it's just being used as a display.
Still, this is a potentially interesting bit of research that could have applications for things that don't need to change very often. Like roadside billboards, or those "you are here" maps in shopping malls. You just do the reset overnight and then you probably won't need to change it again for a few weeks/months/years. And if they can get the refresh rate down, it might even be a competitor to OLED.
I'm not sure how that's better than e-ink, already available. And e-ink displays work, mostly without too much fault or maintenance. Maintaining a live culture of bacteria in a device might be a bit more problematic. Living things, even bacteria, need food of one form or another. e-ink display are cheap enough, at least on a smaller size/form factor, that supermarkets are using them as shelf price tags now. Aldi in particular are using red/black/white ones for all their shelf based product labelling these days.
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