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Science: Health: Pregnancy
Marsupial labour-Saving Device   (+1, -4)  [vote for, against]
Just given birth to a jelly-bean?

Marsupials have almost perfected giving birth. None of this placental rubbish for them, no! No screaming, no gnashing of teeth, no trying to force anything the size of a grapefruit through a pea-sized hole. Kangaroos and their ilk simply pop out a jelly-bean-sized sprog.

But for an otherwise gravidly well-sorted order, what mama marsupial has to do next is quite at odds with her generally lazy nature. All that licking and grooming of hair, while the little pink marsupial bub climbs its way blindly to the pouch? Why, that's time that could be more productively spent delicately grazing, or posing seductively for tourist photos!

Enter the Marsupial MicroBot Collar. With an attached chamber filled with friendly tick-shaped microbots, the MMBC senses the change in the carrier marsupial's hormones at the start of labour, and releases a half-dozen of its charges. These little 'bots- equipped with legs like lice (perfect for hanging onto fur)- scurry down to the marsupial's nether regions, and shepherd the defenseless marsupial progeny up and into the hairy warmth of mama's pouch.

Job completed, they high-five, and scurry back to the MMBC, with tiny, contentedly maternal clucks.

And with the last vestiges of effort conveniently removed from what was never a terribly trying process, mama marsupial takes a mouthful of some kind of vegetation, and winks at the Nikon.
-- m_Al_com, May 15 2006

A solution to a problem no marsupial ever knew she had. [-]
-- SledDog, May 15 2006


Just for you, [Phlish], i will arm one 'bot with a toothpick. If the sprog makes it through, it's 'roosteaks all round in a few years time. If not... canape anyone?
-- m_Al_com, May 17 2006


Is playing with nature well-received at the HB?
-- kuupuuluu, May 17 2006


//Is playing with nature well-received at the HB?//

What else do we do here?
-- methinksnot, May 17 2006


Ta, [mtn]. I didn't want to be the one to have to point it out...
-- m_Al_com, May 21 2006


And if anything should go wrong with the birthing process, the little robots will expell more little robots armed with lasers and call council for assistance.
-- NotTheSharpestSpoon, May 21 2006


Now THAT'S the thinking, [NTSS]!
-- m_Al_com, May 22 2006



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