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Nanosecrets of Everyday Things

Posted by michael on from the attention-to-detail dept.

prostoalex writes "A recent issue of Berkeley Lab Research Review discusses the nanosecrets of everyday things. The article talks about common everyday applications of nanotechnology advances, as well as takes a look at tools used to manipulate itty-bitty widgets."

25 of 90 comments (clear)

  1. Blob? by YanceyAI · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Often these transmission electron microscope images have a "bubble-raft" appearance, in which ordered arrays of little round blobs encounter other arrays oriented differently. Each blob represents a column of atoms; seen from a different angle, the spacing and orientation of the columns gives a different picture, although at some angles the atoms are too close together to resolve. (Emphasis mine)

    Is that the super-technical scientific use of the word blob, or do they just mean, you know, blob?

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    1. Re:Blob? by regen · · Score: 4, Funny

      The technical meaning of blob is Binary Large OBject. It turns out that at a small enough level the universe appears to be a database.

      --
      The Economics of Website Security
    2. Re:Blob? by John+Hasler · · Score: 2

      If it was we wouldn't be spending so much time reverse-engineering it.

      --
      Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
    3. Re:Blob? by Myco · · Score: 2

      So... is particle physics a violation of the DMCA?

      --
      My deviantArt site
  2. Firm grasp of the obvious by Bearpaw · · Score: 4, Insightful
    "If we are going to achieve real nanotechnology, we are going to have to learn how to put atoms together one at a time." (Miquel Salmeron)

    Uh, yeah, that's what nanotechnology means. Or what it used to mean anyway, before it started getting watered down by lame science fiction and people using it for buzzword effect.

    1. Re:Firm grasp of the obvious by jacoberrol · · Score: 4, Informative

      You are confusing nanotechnology with positional assembly

      Assembling things one atom at a time is one way to accomplish nanotechnology, but it would be incorrect to assume it is the only way.

    2. Re:Firm grasp of the obvious by iabervon · · Score: 4, Insightful

      That's not entirely true; the ideal way to do nanotechnology might be to probabilistically arrange groups of atoms into a limited set of arrangements and filter out the undesired ones.

      For some applications, you probably actually do want to build your structures exactly and atom-by-atom. But other applications are best suited to a set of catalysts that will construct a random variant of the structure, so long as it has the property you want, or which will only sometimes construct the right thing, but everything else will be destroyed by another catalyst. For that matter, the most successful method has been to put together reasonably large molecules which are built separately.

      For that matter, depending on what you're making, you may be perfectly happy with a couple of the desired molecules and a lot of innocuous failures. The failures then are basically packing material (you're not going to deliver someone a single molecule; you're going to deliver a manageable volume of uninteresting solution with an interesting molecule in it).

  3. I didn't know.... by I_am_Rambi · · Score: 4, Funny

    "'If you're going to manipulate small things, you need small tools,' says Keith Jackson....Jackson, a physicist in the Materials Sciences Division's Center for X-Ray Optics"

    It took a Physicist to figure that out? I thought little kids can figure that out. I am glad to learn the obvious from a physicist.

    1. Re:I didn't know.... by thrillbert · · Score: 2

      "If you're going to manipulate small things, you need small tools," says Keith Jackson

      And I bet you that if you ask his wife, she has a completely different opinion on the size of the tools!

      ---
      Yes, it's early. I need my coffee.. oh yeah, it's humor too!

    2. Re:I didn't know.... by Conare · · Score: 2

      I am glad to learn the obvious from a physicist
      I think this sadly under moderated reader comment provides a fine rebuttal, if you were being serious. Physicists also like to describe other obvious things like how if you drop something it falls to the ground. I think that Newton guy said something like that.

      --
      Stop Continental Drift! Reunite Gondwanaland!
    3. Re:I didn't know.... by Idarubicin · · Score: 2
      Except that it's not really that obvious, particularly to a physicist.

      The linked article provides discussion of all the nanomanipulation being performed using extremely large tools. The Advanced Light Source (ALS), for instance, has a storage ring about 200 meters in circumference. It can be used for advanced microscopy and nanolithography, among other atom-scale tasks.

      If you want to study something smaller--say, quarks--then you need even bigger tools. CERN, for example. It is 27 kilometers around and straddles the border between two countries.

      --
      ~Idarubicin
  4. Eric Drexler ??? by zebadee · · Score: 4, Funny


    Meg Ryan in the film Innerspace(1987)started the nano-craze for me!

  5. Resolution ... by jetlag11235 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Perhaps I am missing something here, but on the second page, it says: "NCEM's One-Ångstrom Microscope (OÅM) has achieved the country's highest resolution-better than 0.8 angstrom" Then, three paragraphs later, they are suddenly locating columns of silicon atoms with 1/100 angstrom precision. Does this imply that there is some mechanical resolution in the microscope at the 1/100 angstrom level? Is this possible?

  6. the slippery slope of scientific serials. by budalite · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Reading this what-probably-is-a-very-informative article reminds me of the very interesting-looking articles in Scientific American. The first page and about a half of each article is very readable and understandable. Then, all of a sudden, like a Harold LLoyd character (the guy hanging from the way-high-up clock face) stepping from a 3" mudpuddle into a 7' mudpuddle, I find myself so far in over my head so fast that I read another half page before I even realize I have no clue what the fsck I have reading. Like the chicken running around after it has been relieved of its head (another childhood image I will never get out of my head. :P ), I have been reading just because my eyes are still moving. My brain disengaged paragraphs earlier. Whew. I want to be able to understand this sort of stuff in my next life, if there is such a thing... Go, team!

    1. Re:the slippery slope of scientific serials. by fermion · · Score: 2, Insightful
      The things is, reading a scientific paper, even a simple one, is not like reading a novel, a popular magazine, or a newspaper. For one thing, the audience for a science paper is generally considered to be educated, while the audience for other popular media is considered to be less educated, perhaps able to comprehend at an early high school level. Also, the vocabulary used tends to be obscure. This is necessary to allow precise speech. IN addition, science writers sometimes are writers second, which can also cause probles.

      It is possible to slowly get used to reading science, at least in the popular medium such as Scientific American, if not Nature. I remember reading Discover in Jr. High School because I could not understand SA. In time, I was able to read SA. I think I was frustrated because it was so hard to understand, and I was not able to quickly skim the text as I would for other magazines. Even now I have trouble understanding some of the biological science articles.

      So don't worry if comprehension is not what you expect. Look up words if you cannot glean at least some meaning from context. Reading is a skill, and is not neccesarily transferable between genre.

      --
      "She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
    2. Re:the slippery slope of scientific serials. by squaretorus · · Score: 2

      If you get out of your depth reading Scientific American then I suggest you avoid any scientific material - that would REALLY be over your head.

      SciAm, New Scientist etc... all seem to have dumbed down so much over the past 10 years that they now hold little real value. Time was that you could keep up pretty well if you read NS regularly - and have the latest cosmology, cancer and AIDS breakthroughs, computing advances, etc... straight in your head in enough detail to bore people at dinner parties.

      Now its all 'blobs' and 'kind of like spagetti'.

  7. Gray goo by halftrack · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Not all foresee nanotech as something good. Just take a look at this page where some half nutty, half sensible people want to build lifeboats/arks in space so that they can escape from the 'gray goo.'

    --
    Look a monkey!
    1. Re:Gray goo by Dirtside · · Score: 3, Informative

      If you're feeling a little too paranoid, check out this link, where the threat of gray (or black) goo is analyzed a bit. It's not as bad as you think; blue goo should be able to protect us ;)

      (Quick reference:

      gray goo = accidentally released nanobots that eat everything
      black goo = deliberately released nanobots that eat everything
      blue goo = counter-nanobots that prevent gray/black goo from eating everything)

      --
      "Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
  8. Great, tinier junk! by decipher_saint · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Here are my questions about nanotech:

    Where do all the obsolete nanites go? Will they be biodegradable, if so at what rate?

    How tightly would medical nanites be controlled, sold?

    How can we detect nanomachines to protect against potential dangers to ourselves or our nations?

    If something like the "Andromeda Strain" did occur, how would we combat it?

    I realize a lot of these questions are unanswerable, but I'm still curious.

    --
    crazy dynamite monkey
    1. Re:Great, tinier junk! by Idarubicin · · Score: 2
      If something like the "Andromeda Strain" did occur, how would we combat it?

      Okay, it's an interesting post. But I must nitpick. The Andromeda Strain (in its namesake science fiction novel) was not the product of nanotechnology. Rather, it was a rapidly mutating organism returned from space aboard an unmanned military spacecraft.

      That said, I haven't the damndest idea how we would deal with it if it happened--that is, if a virus as deadly as ebola appeared, was highly communicable (airborne spread) and it looked like nothing medical science had ever seen before. I'm thinking that panic, inappropriate and clumsy use of military force, followed by the collapse of civilization would all be part of a likely scenario.

      --
      ~Idarubicin
    2. Re:Great, tinier junk! by BloodSprite · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Where do all the obsolete nanites go?
      Obsolete nanites will be dust and picked up by a vacuum cleaner. it will biodegrade at the same rate as dust.

      How tightly would medical nanites be controlled, sold?
      tightly .. think beter copy protection then the Entertainment industry currently wants(At least I hope so)

      How can we detect nanomachines to protect against potential dangers to ourselves or our nations?
      only with a bath of police nanomachines could any object be declaired free of renegade nanomachines.

      If something like the "Andromeda Strain" did occur, how would we combat it?
      with other nanomachines.

      Also The following limitations will be inharently part of any nanomachine:
      1) It will need a energy source. And if we are smart it will be something we can turn off. (ie radio powered)
      2) It will need to be remote controlled (the processing needed to do anything would take up more space then the nano scale provides with ease). And if we are smart this will be encrypted to hell and the nanomachine does not do anything without a command.

      things we can regulate to be done:
      3) Limit number of generations. A human cell can only devide around 60 times up from a one celled egg, this is the mechanizim that prevents cancer.
      4) Require Trace compounds to turned new machine on and other common compunds to turn it off. 5) require other trace compounds to allow new nanomachine to be made.
      6) limit all nanomachines to only function in a medium other then air. liquides such as specificly your blood or some industrial soup.

      --
      Lifes a game play to win!
    3. Re:Great, tinier junk! by SaturnTim · · Score: 2

      okay, let me take a shot at these:

      1) I think we can spare the landfill space for these molecular junkpiles. Heck, i'll donate a bucket. Since we haven't perfected the perpetual motion machine, I'm guessing they won't run forever, so dumpting the dead little beasties won't be a big deal.

      2) I would assume medical nanites would be controlled the same way perscription drugs are controlled... approved by the FDA after medical trials, manufactured at high prices by drug companies, and sold through official channels.

      3) Look how long it has taken nuke technology to filter down to "The bad guys". This is something far off to worry about. What are you implying anyway? That we shouldn't develop this technology because one of the possable future uses is bad? never mind that it could also do a lot of good...

      4) And if godzilla attacked, what would we do? It's just a book/movie. Sure, it's something to think about... but such trouble is still a long way off... Don't let fear of the unknown stop future development.

      --T

      --
      http://www.theMediaBunker.com
  9. I've done it! by ItWasThem · · Score: 2, Funny

    I have traveled back from the future to enlighten you, my ancestors, and bring about the new era of technological utopia so that you can save the earth, our home, from it's terrible destruction in the year 4572. It is my hope that by bringing about the new dawn centuries earlier that future generations will be able to avert the great cataclysm

    Included below is all of the information you'll need

    .

  10. Re:Nanotech by pokeyburro · · Score: 2

    There's probably a general name for the argument I'm about to use here.

    It's futile to try to ban research of anything. You can warn about the dangers of such-and-such (which you did here, so this isn't a slam on you), you can discourage manufacture of certain products with a specific nefarious purpose, and you can withhold funding. But as for research, sooner or later someone's going to take the effort to figure out anything, as long as it "feels" useful enough, and sometimes it'll get researched just because it's there.

    In other words, "it's dangerous" isn't sufficient reason to stay away from learning about something. Rather, it's an incentive to do even more research, on finding a cure for the secondary problem(s).

    --
    Lately democracy seems to be based on the skybox, the Happy Meal box, the X-box, and the idiot box.
  11. Warning, spoiler for "The Andromeda Strain" by Pseudonymus+Bosch · · Score: 2

    If something like the "Andromeda Strain" did occur, how would we combat it?

    Drinking and crying is what worked in the film. (Don't know about the book). It seems easy, as well.

    --
    __
    Men with no respect for life must never be allowed to control the ultimate instruments of death.
    GW Bu