Experiment

Sterile fly maggots are an FDA-approved medical device. They eat only dead tissue and secrete compounds that clean wounds and kill drug-resistant bacteria. Where antibiotics fail against chronic infections, maggot therapy can work. The FDA cleared it in 2004.

In 1984, Barry Marshall drank Helicobacter pylori culture to prove bacteria caused stomach ulcers after medicine dismissed the idea. He developed gastritis within days, cured himself with antibiotics, and shared the 2005 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Robin Warren.

In 2010, researchers placed oat flakes on a wet dish where cities around Tokyo would be, then added slime mold. The brainless single cell grew tubes between the food and pruned them until its network resembled Tokyo’s rail system in efficiency, cost, and resilience.

In 2008, UCLA showed in Nature that peeling Scotch tape in a vacuum emits nanosecond X-ray bursts. The tape's adhesive side charges positive, outer side negative — a ~40,000 V gap. Accelerated electrons strike across and emit X-rays. They photographed finger bones with it.