In a request released Sept. 14 of this year, the Office Of Naval Research sought to find proposals for "Synthetic Biology Tools for Sensing and Bioprocessing" essentially hybrid, organic inorganic "sensing" robots.

But the language can be deceiving.

Googling the first three words synthetic biology tools yields research in the field of Biofuels. Even the "bioprocessing" part of the request equates to sources of "efficient" fuels in austere conditions. As we've covered most recently, the military is under tremendous pressure to curb its consumption of traditional fossil fuels.

Along with that, it's under even more pressure to reduce casualties on the battlefield arguably the number one metric aside from monetary cost which affects public resistance to foreign military expeditions.

Sure, they're looking for inexpensive, efficient means to fuel war, but they're also looking for more efficient vehicles of war.The language farther in the proposal though makes it clear that the military is investing heavily into smart, cybernetic robots.

From the proposal:

This field is intended to serve two purposes: (1) to allow the design and engineering of organisms that possess a specific, reproducible function from a set of validated genetic parts, circuits and chassis organisms, and, (2) to allow the systematic study of the structure and function of genetic components in natural cellular/multi-cellular systems.

Interpretation: We're looking to connect organic matter, be it single celled or multi-celled, to inorganic, possibly synthetic, circuits.

The organic matter would 'sense' certain stimuli. In one case specifically, chemicals or molecules in the air that would indicate bomb-making materials kind of like a dog's nose connected to a computer.

But then the proposal takes a nasty turn for the weird and scary:

Read more:
The Military Put Out A Research Request For What Amounts To Cybernetic Organisms