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Nanotechnology and its future applications

Jodie

Philosopher
Jodie
Joined
May 7, 2012
Messages
6,231
I was reading a sci-fi series about a post apocalyptic world based on nanotechnology used as WMD by Hugh Howey ( free if you are enrolled in Kindle's unlimited plan). Very interesting series but I guess I was unaware of the applications for the use of nanotechnology today so I decided to Google and this is what I found.

http://io9.com/5967198/8-incredible-nanotechnologies-that-actually-exist-in-the-real-world

I was wondering how future applications might be developed. I'm interested in ideas and what direction the forum members see this new technology evolving.

Here is a good thread about three years old related to medicine. How else could it be used other than what was listed in the article? Could you send them to Mars to build an atmosphere?

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=198114
 
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If freefloating 'dry' nanotech is possible then it would be the most societally disruptive technology ever developed. And quite probably eliminate humanity.
Potentially you could rewrite the human genome in vivio, extract useful elements from the Earth or oceans, manufacture goods cheaply out of exotic material with immense precision (imagine an engine with tolerances below the micron level, made from solid alumina) et cetera.
Or selectively eliminate certain groups based on their genes...
 
Soapy Sam said:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grey_goo
Click to expand...

Those scenarios, while interesting from a story-telling perspective, are basically irrelevant from an actual science perspective. Thermodynamic (and, in some cases, hydrodynamic) considerations make those scenarios basically impossible.

I mean, hell, we've already got aggressive nanobots that try to eat anything they can get their hands on to fuel their self-replication. They're called bacteria. Why haven't bacteria turned the earth into a wasteland? Well, because it's not that easy or that simple, and they have active opposition in the task. Robots won't be any better at it than bacteria, and likely worse.

The only reason that machines are "stronger" than people and animals is because they've got access to more efficient power supplies than biological systems do, and because they can be constructed out of materials with higher strength (and much more energy-intensive manufacturing) than biological materials (such as steel). They don't have the same thermodynamic limits as life precisely because of the ability to concentrate considerable energy in their manufacture and operation.

But those advantages disappears in a grey goo scenario. The goo has to power itself from and build itself out of the same stuff and under the same conditions as biological systems do, and they're not going to be able to do it much better than bacteria because they'll be subject to the same thermodynamic limits as life.
 
catsmate1 said:
If freefloating 'dry' nanotech is possible then it would be the most societally disruptive technology ever developed. And quite probably eliminate humanity.
Potentially you could rewrite the human genome in vivio, extract useful elements from the Earth or oceans, manufacture goods cheaply out of exotic material with immense precision (imagine an engine with tolerances below the micron level, made from solid alumina) et cetera.
Or selectively eliminate certain groups based on their genes...
Click to expand...

In the book series it did eliminate humanity, and every other living thing on the surface of the earth.
 
Soapy Sam said:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grey_goo
Click to expand...

This was especially noteworthy:

Ethics and chaos

Gray goo is a useful construct for considering low-probability, high-impact outcomes from emerging technologies. Thus, it is a useful tool in the ethics of technology. Vallero [14] applied it as a worst-case scenario thought experiment for technologists contemplating possible risks from advancing a technology. This requires that a decision tree or event tree include even extremely low probability events if such events may have an extremely negative and irreversibile consequence, i.e. application of the precautionary principle. Dianne Irving[15] admonishes that "any error in science will have a rippling effect....". Vallero adapted this reference to chaos theory to emerging technologies, wherein slight permuations of initial conditions can lead to unforeseen and profoundly negative downstream effects, for which the technologist and the new technology's proponents must be held accountable.


I have not heard one word about this until I started reading these books. Once the genie is out of the bottle, you rarely get it back in....this is more frightening than nuclear war.
 
Ziggurat said:
Those scenarios, while interesting from a story-telling perspective, are basically irrelevant from an actual science perspective. Thermodynamic (and, in some cases, hydrodynamic) considerations make those scenarios basically impossible.

I mean, hell, we've already got aggressive nanobots that try to eat anything they can get their hands on to fuel their self-replication. They're called bacteria. Why haven't bacteria turned the earth into a wasteland? Well, because it's not that easy or that simple, and they have active opposition in the task. Robots won't be any better at it than bacteria, and likely worse.

The only reason that machines are "stronger" than people and animals is because they've got access to more efficient power supplies than biological systems do, and because they can be constructed out of materials with higher strength (and much more energy-intensive manufacturing) than biological materials (such as steel). They don't have the same thermodynamic limits as life precisely because of the ability to concentrate considerable energy in their manufacture and operation.

But those advantages disappears in a grey goo scenario. The goo has to power itself from and build itself out of the same stuff and under the same conditions as biological systems do, and they're not going to be able to do it much better than bacteria because they'll be subject to the same thermodynamic limits as life.
Click to expand...

What would you do to a nanobot? Spray glue on it?
 
Every time someone raises a doomsday scenario of machines taking over and destroying the Earth, I'm reminded of the last time Windows gave me the Blue Screen of Death.
 
Years ago, just as "nano" was starting to hit the pop-science articles, I read a book about the likely implications.
The author (a science reporter as I recall) had a number of interesting ideas... Mostly in regards to manufacturing and mass production. His notion was that given enough raw materials and nanomachine "assemblers", you could concievably manufacture huge quantities of nearly anything in a very short time, from fabric to weapons.

Among the ideas I recall was roadway materials that would incorporate nano-assembled solar cells, turning entire roadways into electricity-generating devices that could at least stay clear of snow-ice in winter and possibly generate useful power.

Like I say, this was all 20+ years ago and I have no idea how much was pie-in-the-sky.
 
Here's one of the more immediate practical uses of nanotechnology I remember reading about:
http://www.dailytech.com/Scientists...o+Swim+in+Human+Blood+Stream/article14018.htm

Keep in mind that, like any machine we develop, it needs a power source, maintenance, and something to control it. Without those, it will likely get lost or destroyed. This is why I'm skeptical of a "gray goo" scenario. We have computers today, and they're ill-suited for taking over the world, for all the reasons I mentioned.
 
Bikewer said:
Years ago, just as "nano" was starting to hit the pop-science articles, I read a book about the likely implications.
The author (a science reporter as I recall) had a number of interesting ideas... Mostly in regards to manufacturing and mass production. His notion was that given enough raw materials and nanomachine "assemblers", you could concievably manufacture huge quantities of nearly anything in a very short time, from fabric to weapons.

Among the ideas I recall was roadway materials that would incorporate nano-assembled solar cells, turning entire roadways into electricity-generating devices that could at least stay clear of snow-ice in winter and possibly generate useful power.

Like I say, this was all 20+ years ago and I have no idea how much was pie-in-the-sky.
Click to expand...

I recently heard about that road idea from the ecology minded hippies around here. I think they left out the "nano" bit and was thinking along the lines of solar panels laid out as a road. It might work if you put a mono rail in the middle of it to letting the solar energy collected supply the rail but I can't see the panels taking the stress of the weight of the vehicles.
 
Frozenwolf150 said:
Here's one of the more immediate practical uses of nanotechnology I remember reading about:
http://www.dailytech.com/Scientists...o+Swim+in+Human+Blood+Stream/article14018.htm

Keep in mind that, like any machine we develop, it needs a power source, maintenance, and something to control it. Without those, it will likely get lost or destroyed. This is why I'm skeptical of a "gray goo" scenario. We have computers today, and they're ill-suited for taking over the world, for all the reasons I mentioned.
Click to expand...

Well that's good news, We can go back to smoking, drinking, and eating high cholesterol foods without worrying about long term damage.
 
Ziggurat said:
Those scenarios, while interesting from a story-telling perspective, are basically irrelevant from an actual science perspective. Thermodynamic (and, in some cases, hydrodynamic) considerations make those scenarios basically impossible.

I mean, hell, we've already got aggressive nanobots that try to eat anything they can get their hands on to fuel their self-replication. They're called bacteria. Why haven't bacteria turned the earth into a wasteland? Well, because it's not that easy or that simple, and they have active opposition in the task. Robots won't be any better at it than bacteria, and likely worse.

The only reason that machines are "stronger" than people and animals is because they've got access to more efficient power supplies than biological systems do, and because they can be constructed out of materials with higher strength (and much more energy-intensive manufacturing) than biological materials (such as steel). They don't have the same thermodynamic limits as life precisely because of the ability to concentrate considerable energy in their manufacture and operation.

But those advantages disappears in a grey goo scenario. The goo has to power itself from and build itself out of the same stuff and under the same conditions as biological systems do, and they're not going to be able to do it much better than bacteria because they'll be subject to the same thermodynamic limits as life.
Click to expand...

The difference may depend on how much intelligence can be crammed into something that size. Extra somatic intelligence ( ant hill style) may be a way around any such limitation.

I can't see artificial microbiota eating a planet, but eating the people on it seems straightforward enough, given that evolutionary brakes do not apply to man made microscopic suicide bombers. (They don't need to reproduce or evolve. They might. But they don't need to.)


Meanwhile, back in non- sentient applications, I'd say waste management and lubrication are areas I'd expect to see some actual advances in soon.
 
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Many of the applications I've seen suggested for artificial nano-devices, particularly biological applications, would be better served by tailored biological entities, such as bacteria and viruses, taking advantage of a few billion years of evolution to get a head start. There's probably more productive work going on in that arena at present than there is in the field of nano-machines.
 
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dlorde said:
Many of the applications I've seen suggested for artificial nano-devices, particularly biological applications, would be better served by tailored biological entities, such as bacteria and viruses, taking advantage of a few billion years of evolution to get a head start. There's probably more productive work going on in that arena at present than there is in the field of nano-machines.
Click to expand...

I know 20 years ago they were experimenting using the HIV virus ( just the part that replicates, not the actual infectious part) to transport stem cells to specific areas for cancer treatment.

I just recently read an article where they used modified T cells for a dying child as a last ditch effort to treat Leukemia and it seems to work.
 
Frozenwolf150 said:
When we can finally do things like this, then I'll start to worry.
Click to expand...

I don't think we are very far away from that, maybe in 20 years, if not sooner. In the book series I'm reading the nanites prevented organ failure and deterioration which increased the life span to well over 200. Unfortunately, it didn't make you look youthful.
 
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