John Faith brings to our attention a writeup by Annalee Newitz over at io9.com which colorfully describes a new achievement by Foresight Feynman prizewinner Nadrian Seeman and team at NYU and Nanjing U.: Today in Nature, a group of researchers announced they’d successfully operated the first assembly line populated entirely by nanobots. The bots in question… Continue reading DNA-based 'robotic' assembly begins
The Mark, “Canada’s daily online forum for news, commentary, and debate,” has published a commentary that primarily takes a negative view of the use of nanotech (or any tech) for life extension: Extreme life extension raises other interesting, yet troubling questions. Significant life extension could have serious implications for individual identity; what if we change… Continue reading Nanotechnology and life extension: challenge & response
Here we present a special report from Dave Conz of ASU on Josh Hall’s talk and subsequent panel discussion at the SME nanotech conference. An excerpt: Technoscientific development is difficult to direct and nearly impossible to predict. Because of this – not in spite of it – panel discussions like “How Do We Get There… Continue reading Debate: "How do we get there from here?" at SME nano conference
PhysOrg.com brings news and a video of a new 3D patterning technique from IBM that reaches down to 15 nm resolution which “could go even smaller”: IBM Research in Zurich has demonstrated a new nanoscale patterning technique that could replace electron beam lithography (EBL). The demonstration carved a 1:5 billion scale three-dimensional model of the… Continue reading Matterhorn sculpture demos 3D patterning at 15 nm level (IBM video)
David Cassel brings our attention to an h+ review of the long-awaited film The Singularity is Near, based on the book by Ray Kurzweil: In documentary style, we have Ray discussing his ideas about the Singularity, with commentators variously supporting or refuting or worrying about his ideas. With Bill McKibben in the role of the… Continue reading The Singularity is Near: the Movie
Angela Belcher and team at MIT have tweaked a bacterial virus to serve as a scaffolding to: attract and bind with molecules of a catalyst (the team used iridium oxide) and a biological pigment (zinc porphyrins). The viruses became wire-like devices that could very efficiently split the oxygen from water molecules. Belcher says that within… Continue reading MIT's Belcher uses engineered virus to split water
The winner of the 2009 Foresight Feynman Prize in Nanotechnology (Theory), Robert A. Freitas Jr., has now been granted the first diamond mechanosynthesis patent. This is not just the first DMS patent but also, I believe, the first mechanosynthesis patent that has ever been issued. Freitas is the sole inventor on this patent, which was… Continue reading Freitas awarded first mechanosynthesis patent
Once again, the Society of Manufacturing Engineers has donated one free pass to their Nanomanufacturing Conference to Foresight: April 14-15, 2010 — SME Nanomanufacturing Conference Hilton Phoenix East in Mesa, Arizona http://www.sme.org/cgi-bin/get-event.pl?–001875-000007-nhome–SME- This includes free admission to one of the pre-conference workshops on April 13, including Understanding Nanotechnology, taught by Foresight Senior Associate Tihamer “Tee”… Continue reading Free pass to SME Nanomanufacturing Conference
In the mailbag today: A new fiction book Beyond Guilty by Richard Brawer, who got help on it from Robert Freitas, winner of the 2009 Foresight Institute Feynman Prize for Theory. Brawer wrote, “Robert A. Freitas Jr., Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Molecular Manufacturing, has graciously edited the references to nanomanufacturing and nanomedicine… Continue reading New sf novel includes nanomedicine, reviewed by Robert Freitas
If you appreciate the mind-boggling abilities of today’s nanoscale probes and microscopes, and/or want to move your career in the direction of nanotechnology, consider joining the Center for Probing the Nanoscale gang at Stanford’s 6th Annual Nanoprobes Workshop on May 14, 2010. Registration accepted until May 7. Fees range from $100 for industry to free for… Continue reading State-of-the-art Nanoprobes at Stanford, May 14
