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Beetle Naturally Builds Photonic Crystals
esocid writes "Impeding the dream of ultrafast optical computers, we've been unable to build an ideal 'photonic crystal' to manipulate visible light, until now. University of Utah chemists have discovered that nature already has designed photonic crystals with the ideal, diamond-like structure: They are found in the shimmering, iridescent green scales of a beetle from Brazil. The beetle is an inch-long weevil named Lamprocyphus augustus. Bartl and Galusha now are trying to design a synthetic version of the beetle's photonic crystals, using scale material as a mold to make the crystals from a transparent semiconductor. The scales can't be used in technological devices because they are made of fingernail-like chitin, which is not stable enough for long-term use, is not semiconducting and doesn't bend light adequately. Ideal photonic crystals could be used to amplify light and thus make solar cells more efficient, to capture light that would catalyze chemical reactions, and to generate tiny laser beams that would serve as light sources on optical chips."
So, are they going to pay Brazil for the use of one of their "natural resources"?
If they don't Brazil (and others) may continue wiping out their biodiversity that could yield similar or greater benefits (cancer drugs, anyone?) to the global village. If the host country does not benefit (=get paid) for preserving biodiversity, what's their incentive?
We could now go into the whole climate change debate, but that should be obvious to everyone.
The summary starts out by saying the beetle has ideal crystals, only to finish by saying they can't be used because they are not ideal.
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to 45 2F 6E 40 3C DF 10 71 4E 41 DF AA 25 7D 31 3F
Actually, the opposite would be true. If we were harvesting the scales off of these beetles, we would ensure that there were always enough. You don't see cows going on the endangered species list anytime soon, do you? ;-)
Arguing with an engineer is like wrestling a pig in the mud. After a while, you realize the engineer enjoys it.
The exact opposite is true.
Are cows endangered? Chickens? Pigs? Sheep?
If we need them we'll keep them around, sure they might exist solely on "farms" and be breed to better suit us than their survival in the natural world.
But they won't be endangered...
The reason elephants and whales endangered due to over-hunting is mainly because it is hard to raise them. Otherwise, we could have done the whole livestock thing with them too.
Even professionals at zoos have a hard time getting reliable elephant birth rates. Just sustaining them is a challenge.
Oh, and good luck with raising a blue whale in captivity.
Why would you get flamed for things that are perfectly explainable (oh, and observable ;)). Any development that doesn't seem to have an obvious evolutionary advantage does not contradict evolution; they could be vestigial like our appendix or even be atavisms whose genes are coupled with a certain genetic mutation that makes it become dominant again.
Btw, you weren't defending ID here, as you only stated why you think evolution produced some strange effect you couldn't explain. "Defending" it would have meant explaining how putting these seemingly useless traits in there by 'the creator' could in any sense be construed as "intelligent design".
And when you gaze long enough into the code, the code will also gaze into you.
So, it makes one wonder what other great secrets lie in wait in the Amazon - if we could get the bastards to stop destroying it.