One of the main reasons that we are confident in the overall predictions of molecular manufacturing is that there are many pathways to it from current technology and using currently understood science. It is thus something of a milestone that we have arrived at a fork in the road about which there is room for… Continue reading Why the DMS debate is a good thing for nanotech
The following is an edited and revised version of the talk I gave at the Global Catastrophic Risks conference that was held in conjunction with Convergence 08 (and which I reprised for Convergence). I’m posting it here because it seems to me that this is exactly the kind of thing Foresight was founded for: to… Continue reading The weather machine
Arrays of atomic force probe tips are promising nanotech approaches to denser, faster, cheaper memories.
Re-engineering a simple nanotech device to make it more functional, Chinese scientists have developed an improved DNA tweezers that is able to capture, hold, and release a target molecule in a controlled manner.
Robert A. Freitas Jr. brings to our attention a major step on the road to advanced nanotech, published a couple weeks ago in Science (abstract). He writes: This paper reports purely mechanical-based covalent bond-making and bond-breaking (true mechanosynthesis) involving atom by atom substitution of silicon (Si) atoms for tin (Sn) atoms in an Sn monolayer… Continue reading Mechanosynthesis with AFM as a step toward advanced nanotechnology
You might think that by now the definitions of terms like “nanotechnology” and “nanosystems” would be firmly established. In fact the process of arriving at an international consensus is more difficult than you might expect. Representing Foresight in the effort to define these and other terms is David R. Forrest, Ph.D., President of the Institute… Continue reading Defining international standards for nanotechnology
On 5 June 2008, Robert Freitas and Ralph Merkle of the Institute for Molecular Manufacturing (IMM) submitted to IEEE Spectrum the following response to the article “Rupturing the Nanotech Rapture” by Richard A.L. Jones (IEEE Spectrum, June 2008 issue). Their brief letter is reproduced below because Spectrum has chosen to publish only one of the… Continue reading Research challenges for the diamondoid mechanosynthesis path to advanced nanotechnology
DARPA and a Texas fund have awarded $9.7M to investigate one nanotech path toward atomically precise manufacturing.
A pioneering UK program aimed at developing a nanofactory has made a £1.53M ($3M) award to Professor Philip Moriarty of the University of Nottingham to support a five-year series of experiments to investigate the possibility of diamond mechanosynthesis, testing the theoretical proposals recently made by Robert Freitas and Ralph Merkle. Details are contained in the… Continue reading Diamond mechanosynthesis for atomically precise nanotechnology to be explored experimentally
A recent review article delineates engineering principles that may prove valuable for engineering complex nanosystems that can be discerned from the molecular mechanisms by which such biological molecular motors operate and are controlled.
