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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."
R&D: We have this awesome device! And it can tell you everything about anything!
Boss: That sounds great, so what does it say about, say, this test material?
R&D: ....
R&D: We don't know yet. We don't know how to read it yet.
You never realize how much manually made unmanaged "linked" lists suck, till you have src.link.link.link.link...
Maybe now we will be able to determine what can be found McDonald's hamburger patty.
Would this type of detector be able to differentiate between species of bacteria?
The computer prints the following:
1. Your tap water is too hard. Get a water softener.
2. Your dog has ringworm. Bathe him with anti-fungal shampoo.
3. Your daughter has a cocaine habit. Get her into rehab.
4. Your wife is pregnant...twin girls. They aren't yours. Get a lawyer.
5. If you don't stop playing with yourself, your elbow will never get better.
And the optical sensor, while being non-trivial, doens't just sense magically everything from explosives to bacteria. You have to chemically engineer receptors . That's also very non-trivial.
I'll start.
It's called a transporter, it dematerializes and re-materializes anything placed on a raised platform. I have built the platform, all that needs to be done now is to figure out how to de/re-materialize objects.
I've also invented a portable fusion reactor. The concept is that I can fuse everyday objects - garbage - to make unlimited energy. I've got a bunch of garbage, all that needs to be done is figure out how to fuse at room temperatures.
Ok, now you guys come up with amazing inventions. You know, just like the guy in the article did.
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.
A Universal Surface Scanner Detected? Did it show up on radar suddenly or something?
Radar Operator: Chief, we have detected something on radar!
Chief: What is it?
Radar Operator: It appears to be some sort of Universal Surface Scanner.....
Universal Surface Scanner Detected
I wasn't aware that a universal surface scanner existed, nor that there was a detector built to detect universal surface scanners. Now that I know that such a detector exists, and that it has detected a universal surface scanner, I am wondering: was there some sort of SETI-like project - a vast array of detectors just searching for signs of a universal surface scanner? I don't recall anything like this coming up on Slashdot before. How do we know that the detectors haven't registered a false positive. Maybe this isn't a universal surface scanner, but merely a universal surface sensor. Maybe it isn't a universal surface scanner, but one of those surface scanners that can scan the surface of most things, but has problems when it comes to surfaces that are shiney.
Where is this universal surface scanner? Is it something that we can duplicate, now that we know it exists? Is it something that we can retrieve from wherever it is and start scanning surfaces?
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
if it's just down to detecting the frequency of the light emitted, couldn't some sort of photovoltaic or photoelectric sensor be designed so that you wouldn't have to chemically engineer receptors for different kinds of surfaces, but rather just program the software to identify the surface material?
Right Next to the Hottest Furnace, and it's reserved for people who utter the phrase "All you gotta do now is write the software"
From the summary - "All that needs to be done now is build a system able to decode the light signatures.""
None of them can see the clouds; The polished wings don't care.
it's not a tricorder. you need to lay the perforated metal sheet against the surface you want to scan with it.
Actually "Star Trek tricorder invented" is what I had for a headline in the original submission, and it's what the blurb on New Scientist's page said.
Don't let anybody tell you ScuttleMonkey doesn't edit!
Free Martian Whores!
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."
So, basically, we have tricorders that spit out pure gibberish that sounds important. Just like real Star Trek!
Maybe now we will be able to determine what can be found McDonald's hamburger patty.
You laugh, but what I'd like to do with such a thing ain't so far off the mark from that...
Basically, my wife has Celiac disease - if she eats food that has wheat flour or bread crumbs in it (even in very small quantities) it makes her sick. Long-term consequences from repeated poisonings include a higher risk of intestinal cancer...
So the problem is, eating out, it's often hard to know what's safe to eat. If I could get some kind of scanner that could detect gluten in food... that would be awesome.
Of course, from the way this thing works it sounds like the gluten would have to be somewhere near the surface of the food... So I guess it's way too early to get excited...
Bow-ties are cool.
Finally we know what goes between:
1. Shine a laser on a surface full of nanoscale holes. ...and...
3. Profit!