But if you lived in Machu Picchu and needed heart surgery, it would be extremely unlikely that anyone would truck the machine up there. Because you also need a bypass machine. And a damned good anesthesiologist (who probably lives with the other docs in the big city) and the nurses and the dacron grafts and the special sutures and the ventilators and the vent techs and so forth and so on.

So having the smart machine doesn't help you over much. Even for battlefield medicine, I don't think surgical robots are going to prove useful for the same reasons. It's easier to just pack up everyone as a team and dump them on some handy flat piece of ground away from the front. Then drag your victim in using paramedic level persons and helicopters - things that can stand being shot at and don't need high bandwidth connections to function.

The supervision of basic providers is an excellent model but that is typically going to be just video rather than a robot. Anything with opposable thumbs can do a basic cataract - you could build a robot that would do some of the manipulations, but it's pretty automated as it is. There are going to be niches with this sort of tech, certainly we can work on changing some procedures that have remained the same for 200 years, but surgical robots are going to be just a small part of things. Hell, a 3D printer might even be more useful - a common situation in remote areas is that the docs / providers know how to do something, they just don't stock the special screw / graft / gizmo that a bigger hospital would. Even 3D printed orthotics (ie, very low tech) would be pretty useful (and I'm sure I've seen articles where they are starting on this).

If coming up with a cheap nebulizer - which costs a hospital $2.50 for the plastic bits, is the best he can do, then this isn't going to get us far. Sure, the battery powered pump costs a couple of hundred dollars retail but anyone with more than a slotted head screwdriver for a brain is going to realize that it's an aquarium pump. This is hardly the earth shattering breakthrough that TFA insinuates it to be.

The other mentioned device, a better way to extract babies from the birth canal is certainly interesting but it represents the efforts of a single clever person (not associated with the MIT lab in any way). I don't think anyone has decided that there are no more smart people amongst the 7 billion humans on the planet.

Hopefully, this isn't reflecting where MIT is going but I'm beginning towonder. They seem to be in the news for all manner of Silly Little Things associated with important sounding laboratories.

No, I'd suggest getting one before they become impossibly thin and transparent to boot. Then you'd never manage to find the thing once you set it down.

Yes. The entire thesis of the researchers is more than a little bizzare:

No, these machines are going to be used in 'first world' situations in order to help surgeons perform difficult tasks. The idea that someone is going to send a highly complex robot out into the total boonies is pretty far fetched. Surgery is much more than the surgeon. It's the scrub and circulator nurses. It is the sterile OR and equipment. It is anesthesia and pre op and post op nursing. This machine will do little to help with the lack of care.

Now, having a poorly secured surgical robot anywhere isn't such a bright idea and it is likely that the manufacturers need to work on this, but surgery robots are in their infancy at present.

Because 'extremophile' is too hard to spell.

Further, can you imagine an entire state full of Jack Russell terriers?

Scary.

Ripper: Mandrake?
Mandrake: Yes, Jack?
Ripper: Have you ever seen a Commie drink a glass of water?
Mandrake: Well, I can't say I have, Jack.
Ripper: Vodka, that's what they drink, isn't it? Never water?
Mandrake: Well, I-I believe that's what they drink, Jack, yes.
Ripper: On no account will a Commie ever drink water, and not without good reason.
Mandrake: Oh, eh, yes. I, uhm, can't quite see what you're getting at, Jack.
Ripper: Water, that's what I'm getting at, water. Mandrake, water is the source of all life. Seven-tenths of this Earth's surface is water. Why, do you realize that 70 percent of you is water?
Mandrake: Good Lord!
Ripper: And as human beings, you and I need fresh, pure water to replenish our precious bodily fluids.
Mandrake: Yes. (he begins to chuckle nervously)
Ripper: Are you beginning to understand?
Mandrake: Yes. (more laughter)
Ripper: Mandrake. Mandrake, have you never wondered why I drink only distilled water, or rainwater, and only pure-grain alcohol?
Mandrake: Well, it did occur to me, Jack, yes.
Ripper: Have you ever heard of a thing called fluoridation. Fluoridation of water?
Mandrake: Uh? Yes, I-I have heard of that, Jack, yes. Yes.
Ripper: Well, do you know what it is?
Mandrake: No, no I don't know what it is, no.
Ripper: Do you realize that fluoridation is the most monstrously conceived and dangerous Communist plot we have ever had to face?

It will probably take a while for a satellite flyover to check. IIRC there is a hyperaccurate GPS on, or near, the summit so that might give us some info. Remember the Himalayas are pretty active with some areas getting as much as 1 cm / yr in vertical displacement.

Obviously, this is not the high priority right now.

My first (microprocessor) love. And one that would have remained faithful had I not been entranced by bigger silicon....

You certainly would be.

Money.

Lots of money.

Righter tighter
Lefter looser

That stuff is relatively harmless. I'd not suggest using it as an emergency fluid supply for the reasons you and others mention and the fact that propylene glycol is the active ingredient in a number of bowel preparations used to clean the gut completely out before procedures. You'd be sick, nauseated, completely drained and in a world of butt hurt.

But you won't rust.

This. He could just grab a kilo of meth and get arrested. He'd have his year(s) of solitary confinement, the potential for a catastrophe or two, better medical care and a good buzz.

What's not to like?

They make deep cycle lead acid batteries for (mostly) boats. Typically they last 5-6 years in a marine application and you can drain them to about 10% without problems. Newer controllers are good in that regard. I'm using six deep cycle batteries pulled from various boats as my backup system. They should last for at least another 5 years since they are now warm and dry and not vibrating all of the time. They are also fully recyclable.

Not sure why you'd want to go to a lithium based technology in a stationary application.