Weird Science: The Top 5 Strangest Things Ever Seen in a Lab

Most people view scientific research with a combination of awe, wonder, and confusion. Without an upper-level college degree, most of us will never see what goes on behind laboratory doors.

The “mad scientist” image portrayed by the media hasn’t helped to reveal the truth, either. The thought of experimentation conjures up images of bubbling chemicals, mutated test subjects, and the cackling of a crazy-haired man as electricity sparks in the background.

Most real-life labs aren’t quite that dramatic. But when it comes to science, sometimes life really is stranger than fiction. Keep reading for ten examples of how weird science solved some very interesting problems.

1. Player Piano Torpedo Signal

Our first weird science experiment doesn’t come from a Hollywood film, but it does involve an actress, a secret bedroom lab, piano music, and torpedos.

In the year 1940, film starlet Hedy Lamarr met with George Antheil, an avant-garde composer. Surprisingly, both shared an interest in mechanics and weapon design.

Lamarr had previously been married to an arms dealer and amassed a great knowledge of wartime weaponry, especially torpedos. Antheil had once composed a soundtrack that required mechanically synchronizing 16 player pianos and various percussion instruments. The two got to chatting and realized that their combined knowledge could solve the problem of torpedo signals being jammed by enemy forces.

They worked together, likely in Lamarr’s personal laboratory, to create a changeable frequency based on piano music. They operated on the theory that a dynamic frequency was much harder to hack than a static one. They were successful, and the frequency they developed is still used in wi-fi and cellular signals today.

2. Ob/Ob Lab Mouse

Back in the year 1949, researchers at Maine’s Jackson Laboratory started rearing a group of mice. Everything looked normal at first, but as time went on, some of the mice began to eat non-stop. They gained incredible amounts of weight in a short amount of time, much to the scientist’s surprise.

Eventually, they discovered that the extra-fluffy mice had two copies of the ob gene. This gene is responsible for making leptin, a hormone that regulates metabolism and appetite signals. But that’s not even the weird part.

In order to understand how the ob gene worked, researchers created a “frankenmouse” using a technique called parabiosis. This involved making an incision from shoulder to hip on one regular mouse and one ob/ob mouse, then carefully sewing them together like conjoined twins. The end result was two very different mice that shared a common bloodstream.

Once the mice were conjoined, the ob/ob mouse began to eat less and lose weight. Scientists realized that the normal mouse’s satiety hormones (leptin) were helping to regulate the other mouse’s appetite.

Today, ob/ob mice are still used to study conditions like obesity, high cholesterol, and diabetes. To learn more about how cholesterol and other lipid serums are regulated in clinical research, check out this related post.

3. Teeny Tiny Organs

Did you know that this very moment in labs around the world, there are teeny-tiny human organs being grown in Petri dishes? This isn’t mad science: it’s a major development that might help us figure out some unsolved medical mysteries.

These mini organs, called organoids, are clusters of cells that can be any size from 5mm to less than the width of a hair. They begin as stem cells and are grown in an environment that helps them take on the characteristics of a specific human organ. The organoids produced so far have resembled the stomach, liver, kidney, lung, intestine, and even the brain.

But what use could science possibly have for these tiny clumps of cells?

For starters, they give biologists the rare chance to watch organs grow and develop in real time. They also allow scientists to test out new drugs before entering human trials. And finally, growing organoids from a specific person’s stem cells opens up new avenues for personalized medicine.

4. Growing Ears…On Mice?

As if lab-grown organoids weren’t already strange enough, some scientists have tried mice to grow replacement human ears.

Back in the mid-nineties, Harvard surgeons Charles and Joseph Vacanti partnered with Bob Langer, an MIT engineer, to do something that had never been done before. When they asked a children’s reconstructive plastic surgeon what the hardest thing was to repair, the answer was clear: ears.

The scientists began by creating a biodegradable ear-shaped scaffold that was injected with cow cartilage cells. They then implanted it into the back of a hairless mouse. The mouse’s bloodstream provided the cartilage cells with the nutrients they needed to grow until they had replaced the scaffold completely.

This ear was never implanted in a human, but it did spark new theories on how to approach reconstructive surgery. Since then, surgeons have successfully used patients’ own arms to grow ears instead of mice.

5. Particle Robots

Research teams from MIT, Columbia University, and elsewhere have joined forces to rethink the concept of robotics. They took inspiration from how living cells interact with each other to design “particle robots,” a network of individual bots (particles) that can work together to complete a goal.

One particle robot can’t do much on its own. Built from plastic, magnets, and some simple electronics, each particle is only able to expand and contract. But when you put multiple particles in contact with each other, they interact to push objects, navigate obstacles, or move toward a light source.

While these particle bots aren’t quite the “gray goo” of sci-fi legend, they’re one big step closer to autonomous nanotech. The researchers hope that someday they’ll be able to turn this concept into a bot that’s made from millions of microscopic particles. 

Weird Science Just Keeps Getting Weirder

As our knowledge and tech continue to advance, things are only going to get more fascinating behind lab doors. Who knows what strange way to solve a problem scientists will come up with next?

Are you in the mood for more weird science? If so, check out this post to learn about 12 weird medical procedures that actually worked!

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