Pneumatic Tube Communication In Hospitals

blee37 sends along a writeup from the School of Medicine at Stanford University on their pneumatic tube delivery system, used for sending atoms not bits. Such systems are in use in hospitals nationwide; the 19th-century technology is enhancd by recent refinements in pneumatic braking. "Every day, 7,000 times a day, Stanford Hospital staff turn to pneumatic tubes, cutting-edge technology in the 19th century, for a transport network that the Internet and all the latest Silicon Valley wizardry can't match: A tubular system to transport a lab sample across the medical center in the blink of an eye."

Comments

Re:Rollofle, you can't download a pizza either

[Discordantus]

The point of this article is that pneumatic tube networks are frelling cool, and they're old tech. To many persons of geeky persuasion (including me), this type of thing is fascinating.