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Universal Surface Scanner Detected
mcgrew writes to tell us that scientists at the University of California, San Diego, have created a new system that can test any surface for just about anything. "Their idea uses a thin layer of metal drilled with nanoscale holes, laid onto the surface being tested. When the perforated plate is zapped with laser light, the surface plasmons that form emit light with a frequency related to the materials touching the plate. A sensitive light detector is needed to measure the frequency of light given off. The team says devices using this approach can be small and portable, will work on very low power, and could detect everything from explosives to bacteria. All that needs to be done now is build a system able to decode the light signatures."
Sounds like a good way to obtain more funding.
Write up another grant proposal or three, have another round of graduate students write their thesis/dissertations on the project, etc.
It does seem humorous that the scientist claimed he built a multi-surface detector which actually doesn't detect anything in particular. However, even if a few surfaces can be detected, this invention could be extremely useful in several fields. For instance, you might be able to use it to differentiate between very similar minerals or metals, or possibly even determine what combination of materials exist in a single surface. This could save a significant amount of time in testing and traditional analysis.
42! 42! 42!
It's an early model tricorder. In 200 years you'll be able to point it at something across the room. Look at the first telephone and a modern telephone, and it's only been a hundred years between the two. Look at the Wright Brothers airplane in 1903 and the Saturn V that went to the moon just 65 years later, or a stealth fighter/bomber.
Free Martian Whores!
Whenever an article about an amazing new breakthrough contains the words all that needs to be done I deflate my expectations and walk quietly away. All that needs to be done here is to actually get it working. Who knows, the scanner plate is small, but it may require a computer the size of a major city's sports arena to handle the results.
Move along, there's nothing to see here yet.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
While I appreciate the joke you've made, it's important to keep in mind - this system seems to have taken a very difficult and tedious chemistry/physics problem and relegated it to the slightly less difficult and tedious realm of signal processing.
Even people that believe in pre-destiny look both ways before crossing the street.
Finally we know what goes between:
1. Shine a laser on a surface full of nanoscale holes. ...and...
3. Profit!