A response to my “Parricide” essay has been seen on IEEE’s Tech Talk blog. Dexter Johnson gives a fair summary of the positions taken to date, and says As the argument seems to go, Drexler popularized the term nanotechnology in his book Engines of Creation, and so when the general public heard that thousands of… Continue reading The nanotechnology we were promised
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
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
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.
On the Editor’s Page at Medical DeviceLinkCom, Shana Leonard writes about the crucial need for design and modeling techniques to guide nanosystems development toward fabrication, and cites the Technology Roadmap for Productive Nanosystems. From “A Different Kind of Intelligent Design” Drawing from numerous workshops held from 2005 to 2007, Battelle (Columbus, OH) and the Foresight… Continue reading Nanotechnology roadmap draws attention for importance of nanosystems design
Advanced nanotech might benefit if proteins could be arrayed on a surface so that they could be quickly and easily scanned for function or interactions with other molecules.
A new concept for a very cheap plastic nanotech memory has been developed by combining the favorable properties of ferroelectrics and semiconductors.
Will nanotechnology culminate with diamondoid nanorobots produced in nanofactories by atomically precise mechanosynthesis, or with “soft” machines that mimic the way biological molecular machines work?
