Doom has long been known among modders as one of the easiest games to run. It has long become a meme because it can be powered by literally anything (a thermostat, a pregnancy test, an ATM, and even a standard Windows laptop).

Doom launched on gut bacteria

MIT bioengineering student Lauren Ramlan made Doom playable on gut bacteria to really prove the theory that the game can run on anything. But in reality everything is not so simple.

To be specific, Ramlan doesn’t literally treat Doom with gut bacteria. Instead, the researcher created a screen that used E. coli bacteria to play Doom.

The 32 x 48 single-bit monochromatic display uses fluorescent protein-filled bacteria. At the same time, each one acts as a separate pixel. Using cells, you can recreate Doom gameplay with this very low resolution screen.

The end of gut bacteria: watch the video

However, Lauren Ramlan noted that it takes a long time for the cells to be properly illuminated. It took 70 minutes for the cells to brighten the image and then another 8 hours and 20 minutes to darken so they could be reset for the next frame. This means that the bacterial screen takes about eight and a half hours to load each frame.

According to the scientist’s calculations, it would take 600 years to complete Doom on intestinal bacterial cells. But technically it is quite possible.