MicroCHIPS, an IT start-up company with links to Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is developing a radical new contraceptive - a tiny microchip implanted under the skin that can be operated wirelessly by remote control.
In the 1990s, Robert S. Langer - the David H. Koch Institute Professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and reportedly "the most cited engineer in history" - and his colleagues Michael Cima and John Santini, developed a microchip technology that could release controlled amounts of chemicals.
Fast-forward to 2012, and Langer's MIT lab received a visit from Bill Gates, who inquires with Langer whether it would be feasible to create a new method of birth control that a woman could turn on and off as she likes and which she can use for many years.