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C-R-Newsletter #48 December 29, 2006
* SPECIAL YEAR-END ISSUE *
Happy Birthday to Us!
This month marks the four-year anniversary of CRN's founding. In this special
expanded edition of the C-R-Newsletter, we'll review some of the major
nano-related events of 2006 and highlight a few of our proudest accomplishments
from the past 12 months.
January: Feature Article
on Nanofactories
February: WorldChanging
Interview
February: CRN Goes to
Switzerland
March: CRN Task Force
Publishes First 11 Essays
April: State of Global
Emergency
April: CRN Goes to New Jersey
May: CRN Task Force Publishes 11
More Essays
June: Nanofactory
Development Project
July: Back to Switzerland
August: CRN Goes to
Tennessee
September: New Zealand and
Australia
October: Doomsday Discussion
October: CRN at the Naval War
College
October: Global Futures
Strategist
November: CRN Goes to South
America
December: National Academy of
Sciences Report
Every month is full of activity for CRN. To follow the latest
happenings on a daily basis, be sure to check our
Responsible Nanotechnology weblog.
==========
January: Feature Article on Nanofactories
A special report titled
"Nanofactories: Glimpsing the future of process technology" was the cover
article for the January 2006 issue of CleanRooms Magazine. The lengthy
article, subtitled "Making sense of the molecular machine shop," quoted
extensively from CRN Research Director Chris Phoenix, as well as from nanotech
researchers Robert A. Freitas Jr. and Ralph Merkle. We described it on our blog
as a "must read."
February: WorldChanging Interview
"Revolution in a Box" was the title of a
long
interview about CRN's work posted by Jamais Cascio at the popular
WorldChanging web site. This is how the article was introduced:
Founded in December 2002, the Center for Responsible
Nanotechnology has a modest goal: to ensure that the planet navigates the
emerging nanotech era safely. That's a lot for a couple of volunteers to
shoulder, but Mike Treder and Chris Phoenix have carried their burden well, and
done much to raise awareness of the potential risks and benefits of molecular
manufacturing, including a major presentation at the US Environmental Protection
Agency on the impacts of nanotechnology. We first linked to CRN back in October
of 2003, and have long considered them a real WorldChanging ally.
February: CRN Goes to Switzerland
Twice this year, CRN Executive Director Mike Treder traveled to Zurich,
Switzerland, to participate in "Risk Governance for Nanotechnology" workshops
organized by the International
Risk Governance Council. Among the 30 attendees at the February event were
representatives from the European Commission, the Organisation for Economic
Co-operation and Development (OECD), the World Economic Forum, Environmental
Defense, CBEN at Rice University, Swiss RE, Pfizer, and the NanoBusiness
Alliance.
This event was coordinated by Ortwinn Renn from the University of Stuttgart and
Mike Roco from the U.S. National Science and Technology Council, and moderated
by Tim Mealey of the Meridian Institute. CRN was pleased overall with the
direction taken and with the content of the workshop. It was refreshing to see
that some international leaders were willing to consider longer-term risks and
more serious implications than nanoparticle toxicity.
March: CRN Task Force Publishes First 11 Essays
In August 2005, the Center for Responsible Nanotechnology
announced the formation of a Global Task Force
convened to study the societal implications of this rapidly emerging technology.
For their first major project, members of the CRN Task Force
chose to generate a range of independent essays identifying and defining
specific concerns about the possibilities of advanced nanotechnology. The first
11 of those essays were published in the March 2006 issue of
Nanotechnology
Perceptions, a peer-reviewed academic journal of the Collegium Basilea
in Basel, Switzerland. The essays also were posted for
reader commentary at KurzweilAI.net, and on Wise-Nano.org.
April: State of Global Emergency
CRN Executive Director Mike Treder was invited to take part in a special meeting
in Bellevue, Washington, called "Crossroads for Planet Earth" sponsored by the
Foundation
For the Future. Topics included human population, extreme and widespread
poverty, biodiversity, energy and environment, public health, world economies,
and global priorities. Nine participants, described as "experts in these
fields...plus additional voices from the USA and abroad," made presentations and
were joined in discussion by principals from the foundation.
Based on what was shared at the meeting, it is clear that we are in a state of
global emergency regarding the potential for rapid and disastrous climate
change. This may not be news for most C-R-Newsletter readers, but the
statistical evidence presented at this event was highly alarming. CRN's
presentation on "Nanotechnology: Driving Toward a Crisis" emphasized the
opportunity for exponential general-purpose molecular manufacturing to enable
intervention in the rapid deterioration of global climate stability. Of course,
the same technology that will provide many potential
benefits also can be misused and cause great harm.
April: CRN Goes to New Jersey
The New Jersey Institute of
Technology invited Chris Phoenix, CRN's Director of Research, to conduct a
two-hour public seminar on "Nanotechnology: Its Promises and Perils." The event
took place on April 5 and was well attended.
A
video archive
of the talk is online.
The following day, Chris was able
to have several informal group discussions with physics students and professors
from NJIT about both technical matters and ethical implications of advanced
nanotechnology.
May: CRN Task Force Publishes 11 More Essays
The second set of essays written by members of CRN's Global
Task Force on Implications and Policy were published in the May 2006 issue
of
Nanotechnology Perceptions, and also online.
These essays covered topics from commerce to criminology, from ethics to
economics, and from our remote past to our distant future. Taken together, they
begin to illustrate the profoundly transformative impact that
molecular manufacturing will have on every aspect of
human society.
June: Nanofactory Development Project
In a highly significant development, Robert A. Freitas Jr. and Ralph Merkle
launched a website announcing a "Nanofactory
Collaboration." This is the first project explicitly aimed at building a
high-performance general-purpose nanofactory manufacturing system based on
molecular manufacturing. (The
Foresight/Battelle Roadmap is
focused more on near-term
technologies leading toward molecular manufacturing.) The timeline of the project calls for initial
diamond mechanosynthesis in 2010, with "nanofactories and nanorobotic products"
beginning around 2020. CRN will continue watching with great interest to see how
this project progresses, and working to steer it in responsible directions.
July: Back to Switzerland
In early July, CRN Executive Director Mike Treder returned to Zurich,
Switzerland, for another meeting sponsored by the International Risk Governance
Council. Participants reviewed a
white paper [PDF] on risk
governance of nanotechnology, deliberated in breakout groups, and listened to
several distinguished speakers. Here is part of
Mike's report about the event:
During one of the breakout sessions, some people complained about
an overemphasis on human enhancement issues in the white paper, especially when
compared with the scant references to the risk of a nanotechnology arms race and
possible warfare. I made the point that a nano-enabled arms race is almost
certain to be less stable than the nuclear arms race, and therefore more likely
to result in devastating war. I also proposed, on behalf of CRN, the need for an
International NanoTechnology Arms Control Treaty, or INTACT.
CRN was not the only NGO (non-governmental organization) among the 100 or so
conference attendees. Representatives from Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth,
Practical Action, the Meridian Institute, the Woodrow Wilson Center, Demos, the
Foresight Nanotech Institute and others were there. Although we had a wide range
of concerns and points of view, there was strong consensus between NGOs on the
need for a longer-range outlook and more serious consideration of the
potentially transformative impacts of molecular manufacturing.
August: CRN Goes to Tennessee
CRN's Director of Research, Chris Phoenix, traveled to Oak Ridge, Tennessee, in
August to speak at a
conference titled "The Next Industrial Revolution: Nanotechnology and
Manufacturing." The conference was sponsored by the Society of Manufacturing
Engineers. Chris's talk, "From Nanotechnology to Molecular Manufacturing,"
focused on why molecular manufacturing will be very attractive to develop and
described several pathways to development. Two other speakers, Josh Hall and
Tihamer Toth-Fejel, also made molecular manufacturing the topic of their
remarks.
September: New Zealand and Australia
CRN Executive Director Mike Treder was the featured speaker in the annual
Pickering Lecture Tour organized by the
Institution of
Professional Engineers New Zealand. Mike gave talks in ten New Zealand
cities over a two-week period, with
overflow audiences in many places and lots of interest in CRN's ideas about
responsible use of molecular manufacturing. He was interviewed twice on the
country's national radio network. After New Zealand, Mike spent a week in
Australia, giving talks to large audiences at three universities. That trip
prompted significant
media coverage.
October: Doomsday Discussion
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists -- famed for its
Doomsday
Clock that now sits at seven minutes to midnight -- held a series of
"Doomsday Reconsidered" meetings throughout 2006 to look at future threats to
civilization. In October, CRN Director of Research Chris Phoenix took part in a
program in Washington DC sponsored by the group. Chris was invited to speak
about "Threats to Society from Nanotechnology."
October: CRN at the Naval War College
Also in October, CRN Executive Director Mike Treder met with a group of senior
officers and affiliated civilian researchers at the US
Naval War College in
Newport, Rhode Island. Mike was invited to address the
Strategic Studies Group
on the subject of the disruptive potential of molecular manufacturing. The
wide-ranging three-hour conversation covered not just military applications, but
other societal implications as well.
October: Global Futures Strategist
Jamais Cascio, who writes about the intersection of emerging technologies and
cultural transformation, and who specializes in the design and creation of
plausible scenarios of the future, was appointed this year as a
Global Futures Strategist for CRN. In
2003, Jamais co-founded the award-winning weblog
WorldChanging.com,
covering topics including energy and the environment, global development, open
source technologies, and catalysts for social change. His essays about
technology and society have appeared in a variety of publications, and he has
worked on a number of television, film, and game projects, including two books
for the science fiction game series
Transhuman Space.
November: CRN Goes to South America
Chris Phoenix, Director of Research for CRN, visited Sao Paulo, Brazil, to
participate in the
Third International Seminar on Nanotechnology, Society, and the Environment.
He spoke on the subject of nanotechnology and economics.
Chris went from Brazil to
Caracas, Venezuela, where he was the featured speaker at a
half-day symposium on nanotechnology. Chris talked about the implications of
nanotechnology for developing countries. His remarks were written up in detail
in El Nacional, a major Venezuelan newspaper.
December: National Academy of Sciences Report
At the end of the year, the US National Academy of Sciences released its
long-awaited analysis of molecular manufacturing, in "A Matter of Size:
Triennial Review of the National Nanotechnology Initiative." Conclusions
published in the report are likely to accelerate research toward the development
of molecularly-precise manufacturing. However, without adequate understanding
and preparation, exponential atom-by-atom construction of advanced products
could have catastrophic results. Because increased funding of research leading
toward exponential construction of atomically-precise products is now a strong
possibility, CRN urgently recommends equivalent
funding and priority for research into the profound societal and environmental
implications of molecular manufacturing, including consideration of the most
aggressive potential timelines and powerful capabilities.
That concludes our year-end wrap up -- Happy New Year!
C-R-Newsletter #47 November 30, 2006
CRN at
Brazil Nanotech Seminar
CRN Speaks in Venezuela
CRN Goes Around the World
WorldChanging Book Published
IEEE Fellows Predictions
Website Upgrade Begins
Feature Essay:
Preventing Errors in Molecular
Manufacturing
Every month is full of activity for CRN. To follow the latest
happenings on a daily basis, be sure to check our
Responsible Nanotechnology weblog.
==========
CRN at Brazil
Nanotech Seminar
Chris Phoenix, Director of
Research for CRN, was in Brazil earlier this month to participate in the
Third International Seminar on Nanotechnology, Society, and the Environment.
He spoke on the subject of nanotechnology and economics.
Much of the conference focus was on the social and economic aspects of
technology. Nanotechnology was seen as one of a cluster of new technologies,
such as new agricultural and medical technologies, that raise social as well as
technical issues. Chris made connections with attendees and speakers from
several different continents.
CRN Speaks in Venezuela
After leaving Brazil, Chris
traveled to Caracas, Venezuela, where he was the featured speaker at a half-day
symposium on nanotechnology. Chris talked about the implications of
nanotechnology for developing countries. His remarks were
well received by an audience of about forty, and were written up in detail in
El Nacional, a major Venezuelan
newspaper.
We want to thank José Luis
Cordeiro, from CRN's Board of Advisors, for
helping to make this event possible.
CRN Goes Around the World
Since the founding of CRN in
December 2002, we have had the opportunity to address conferences and groups in
twelve countries on five continents. Our work has been published extensively
in Chinese, Russian, Spanish, and Portuguese (as well as English), and
references to "Center for Responsible Nanotechnology" can be found
on the Internet in at least 15 additional languages, including Arabic,
Czech, Dutch, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Persian,
Polish, Swedish, and Turkish.
Based on
one analysis of the world’s most influential languages, the next most
valuable language to have our ideas published in would be French, although
Arabic, German, Japanese, and Hindu/Urdu also would be very useful.
Previous translation of CRN's work has been accomplished by
volunteers. We thank them, and encourage volunteer translators in other
languages to come forward.
WorldChanging Book Published
Worldchanging: A
User's Guide for the 21st Century was published on November 1. This
608-page book includes chapters on Cities, Communities, Business, Politics,
Shelter, and more. CRN wrote quite a bit of material for the book's section on
nanotechnology. We’ve received our contributor’s copy and have to say we’ve seen
nothing else like it since the good old days of the Whole Earth Catalog.
According to the book’s editor,
Alex
Steffen, sales are brisk and reviews have been almost uniformly positive.
IEEE Fellows Predictions
More than 700
IEEE Fellows — about half of them academic researchers, the rest working in
industry — were asked to forecast trends within their area of expertise over the
next 50 years.
The survey was a joint study conducted earlier this year by the Institute
for the Future and IEEE Spectrum. CRN’s Chris Phoenix analyzed some of
the results in
an article for our blog. Here is some of what he wrote:
56% of experts thought it was likely that it will be "commercially viable to
manufacture nanostructured materials to exact specifications without machining."
And of those, over 75% thought that this would happen within 20 years or less.
Meanwhile, almost 2/3 of experts expected "robust design tools for fabrication
at the nanoscale" to become available. They weren't asked directly about
molecular manufacturing, but enabling technologies are certainly looking
plausible. If you can do NEMS, five-nanometer commercial lithography, robust
design, and built-to-order nanostructured materials, then it's not a very big
step from there to NEMS-building-NEMS.
The paradigm is shifting. The nanoscale is rapidly moving from the domain of
scientists to the domain of engineers -- and the engineers know it, and are
looking forward to it.
Website Upgrade Begins
CRN’s main website (the one
you're on) has not changed much — in terms of its software platform and its
design — since we first went online in December 2002. We have added a
significant amount of content, of course, and many new features, but the site
has been in need of an overall upgrade for some time. Now we’re pleased to
announce that we have begun that process. We expect to have an improved
navigation structure, a cleaner look, and, most important, a more stable
software platform along with a more reliable server host. Great stuff ahead.
Feature Essay:
Preventing Errors in Molecular Manufacturing
Chris Phoenix, Director of Research, Center for Responsible Nanotechnology
What kind of system can perform a
billion manufacturing operations without an error?
Many people familiar with today's manufacturing technologies will assume that
such a thing is near-impossible. Today's manufacturing operations are doing very
well to get one error in a million products. To reduce the error to one in a
billion--to say nothing of one in a million billion, which Drexler talks about
in
Nanosystems--seems
ridiculously difficult. None of today's technologies could do it, despite many
decades of improvement. So how can molecular manufacturing theorists reasonably
expect to develop systems with such low error rates--much less, to develop them
on a schedule measured in years rather than decades?
There are physical systems today that have error rates even lower than molecular
manufacturing systems would require. A desktop computer executes more than a
billion instructions each second, and can operate for years without a single
error. Each instruction involves tens of millions of transistors, flipping on or
off with near-perfect reliability. If each transistor operation were an atom,
the computer would process about a gram of atoms each day--and they would all be
flawlessly handled.
The existence of computers demonstrates that an engineered, real-world system,
containing millions of interacting components, can handle simple operations in
vast numbers with an insignificant error rate. The computer must continue
working flawlessly despite changes in temperature, line voltage, and
electromagnetic noise, and regardless of what program it is asked to run.
The computer can do this because it is digital. Digital values are
discrete--each signal in the computer is either on or off, never in-between. The
signals are generated by transistor circuits which have a non-linear response to
input signals; an input that is anywhere near the ideal "on" or "off" level will
produce an output that is closer to the ideal. Deviations from perfection,
rather than building up, are reduced as the signal propagates from one
transistor to another. Even without active error detection, correction, or
feedback, the non-linear behavior of transistors means that error rates can be
kept as low as desired: for the purposes of computer designers, the error rate
of any signal is effectively zero.
An error rate of zero means that the signals inside a computer are perfectly
characterized: each signal and computation is exactly predictable. This allows a
very powerful design technique to be used, called "levels of abstraction."
Error-free operations can be combined in intricate patterns and in large
numbers, with perfectly predictable results. The result of any sequence of
operations can be calculated with certainty and precision. Thousands of
transistors can be combined into number-processing circuits that do arithmetic
and other calculations. Thousands of those circuits can be combined in
general-purpose processor chips that execute simple instructions. Thousands of
those instructions can be combined into data-processing functions. And those
functions can be executed thousands or even billions of times, in any desired
sequence, to perform any calculation that humans can invent... performing
billions of billions of operations with reliably zero errors.
Modern manufacturing operations, for all their precision, are not digital. There
is no discrete line between a good and a bad part--just as it's impossible to
say exactly when someone who loses one hair at a time becomes bald. Worse, there
is no mechanism in manufacturing that naturally restores precision. Difficult
and complicated processes are required to construct a machine more precise than
the machines used to build it. To build a modern machine such as a
computer-controlled lathe requires so many different techniques--polymer
chemistry, semiconductor lithography, metallurgy and metal working, and
thousands of others--that the "real world" will inevitably create errors that
must be detected and corrected. And to top it off, machines suffer from
wear--their dimensions change as they are used.
Given the problems inherent in today's manufacturing methods and machine
designs, the idea of building a fully automated general-purpose manufacturing
system that could build a complete duplicate of itself... is ridiculous.
The ability to form covalent solids by placing individual molecules changes all
that. Fundamentally, covalent bonds are digital: two atoms are either bonded, or
they are held some distance apart by a repelling force. (Not all bond types are
fully covalent, but many useful bonds including carbon-carbon bonds are.) If a
covalent bond is stretched out of shape, it will return to its ideal
configuration all by itself, without any need for external error detection,
correction, or feedback.
If a covalent-bonding manufacturing system performs an operation with less than
one atom out of place, then the resulting product will have exactly zero atoms
out of place. Just like transistor signals in a digital computer, imperfections
fade away all by themselves. (In both cases, a bit of energy is used up in
making the imperfections disappear.) In digital systems, there is no physical
law that requires imperfections to accumulate into errors--not in digital
computer logic, and not in atomic fabrication systems.
Atomic fabrication operations, like transistor operations, can be characterized
with great reliability. Only a few transistor operations are a sufficient
toolkit with which to design a computer. A general-purpose molecular
manufacturing system may use a dozen or so different kinds of atoms, and perhaps
100 reactions between the atoms. That is a small enough number to study each
reaction in detail, and know how it works with as much precision as necessary.
Each reaction can proceed in a predictable way each and every time it is
attempted.
A sequence of completely predictable operations will itself have a completely
predictable outcome, regardless of the length of the sequence. If each one of a
sequence of a billion reactions is carried out as expected, then the final
product can be produced reliably.
Chemists who read this may be objecting that there's no such thing as a reaction
with 100% yield. Answering that objection in detail would require a separate
essay--but briefly, mechanical manipulation and control of reactants can in many
cases prevent unwanted reaction pathways as well as shifting the energetics so
far (hundreds of zJ/bond or kJ/mole) that the missed reaction rate is reduced by
many orders of magnitude.
At this point, it is necessary to consider the "real world." What factors, in
practice, will reduce the predictability of mechanically-guided molecular
reaction machinery?
One factor that doesn't have to be considered in a well-designed system of this
type is wear. Again, it would take a separate essay to discuss wear in detail,
but wear in a covalent solid requires breaking strong inter-atomic bonds, and a
well-designed system will never, in normal operation, exert enough force on any
single atom to cause its bonds to break. Likewise, machines built with the same
sequence of reliable operations will themselves be identical. Once a machine is
characterized, all of its siblings will be just as fully understood.
Mechanical vibration from outside the system is unlikely to be a problem. It is
a problem in today's nanotech tools because the tools are far bigger than the
manipulations or measurements those tools perform--big enough to have slow
vibrational periods and high momentum. Nanoscale tools, such as would be used in
a molecular manufacturing system, would have vibrational frequencies in the
gigahertz or higher, and momentum vanishingly small compared to restoring
forces.
It is possible that vibrations generated within the system, from previous
operations of the system or of neighboring systems, could be a problem. In
computers, transistor operations can cause voltage ripples that cause headaches
for designers, and are probably analogous. But these problems are practical, not
fundamental.
Contaminant molecules should not be a problem in a well-designed system. The
ability to build covalent solids without error implies the ability to build
hermetically sealed enclosures. Feedstock molecules would have to be taken in
through the enclosures, but sorting mechanisms have been planned that should
reject any contaminants in the feedstock stream with extremely low error rates.
There are ways for a manufacturing system inside a sealed enclosure to build
another system of the same size or larger without breaking the seal. It would
take a third essay to discuss these topics in detail, but they have been
considered and none of the problems appears unlikely to be addressable in
practice.
Despite everything written above, there will be some fraction of molecular
manufacturing systems that suffer from errors--if nothing else, background
levels of ionizing radiation will cause at least some bond breakage. In theory,
an imperfect machine could fabricate more imperfect machines, perpetuating and
perhaps exacerbating the error. However, in practice, this seems unlikely.
Whereas a perfect manufacturing machine could do a billion operations without
error, an imperfect machine would probably make at least one atom-placement
error fairly early in the fabrication sequence. That first error would leave an
atom out of its expected position on the surface of the workpiece. A flawed
workpiece surface would usually cause a cascade of further fabrication errors in
the same product, and long before a product could be completed, the process
would be hopelessly jammed. Thus, imperfect machines would quickly become inert,
before producing even one imperfect product.
The biggest source of unpredictability probably will be thermal noise, sometimes
referred to as Brownian motion. (Quantum uncertainty and Heisenberg uncertainty
are similar but smaller sources of unpredictability.) Thermal noise means that
the exact dimensions of a mechanical system will change unpredictably, too
rapidly to permit active compensation. In other words, the exact position of the
operating machinery cannot be known. The degree of variance depends on the
temperature of the system, as well as the stiffness of the mechanical design. If
the position varies too far, then a molecule-bonding operation may result in one
of several unpredictable outcomes. This is a practical problem, not a
fundamental limitation; in any given system, the variance is limited, and there
are a number of ways to reduce it. More research on this point is needed, but so
far, high-resolution computational chemistry experiments by Robert Freitas seem
to show that even without using some of the available tricks, difficult
molecule-placement operations can be carried out with high reliability at liquid
nitrogen temperatures and possibly at room temperature. If positional variance
can be reduced to the point where the molecule is placed in approximately the
right position, the digital nature of covalent bonding will do the rest.
This is a key point:
The mechanical unpredictability in
the system does not have to be reduced to zero, or even extremely close to zero,
in order to achieve extremely high levels of reliability in the product.
As long as each reaction trajectory leads closer to the right outcome than to
competing outcomes, the atoms will naturally be pulled into their proper
configuration each time--and by the time the next atoms are deposited, any
positional error will have dissipated into heat, leaving the physical bond
structure perfectly predictable for the next operation.
Molecular manufacturing requires an error rate that is extremely low by most
standards, but is quite permissive compared to the error rates necessary for
digital computers. Error rate is an extremely important topic, and
unfortunately, understanding of errors in mechanically guided chemistry is
susceptible to incorrect intuitions from chemistry, manufacturing, and even
physics (many physicists assume that entropy must increase without considering
that the system is not closed). It appears that the nature of covalent bonds
provides an automatic error-reducing mechanism that will make molecular
manufacturing closer in significant ways to computer logic than to today's
manufacturing or chemistry.
Three previous science essays have touched on related topics:
Who remembers
analog computers? (February 2006)
Coping with
Nanoscale Errors (September 2004)
The Bugbear of
Entropy (May 2004)
Subsequent CRN science
essays will cover topics that this essay raised but did not have space to cover
in detail.
C-R-Newsletter #46 October 30, 2006
Doomsday Discussion
CRN at the Naval War College
Global Futures Strategist
New Zealand Gets Organized
Treder Speech for Download
CRN Goes to Brazil
Books in the Works
Feature Essay: Recycling
Nano-Products
Every month is full of activity for CRN. To follow the latest
happenings on a daily basis, be sure to check our
Responsible Nanotechnology weblog.
==========
Doomsday Discussion
The Bulletin of the Atomic
Scientists—famed for its
Doomsday
Clock that now sits at seven minutes to midnight—is holding a series of
“Doomsday Reconsidered” meetings this year to look at future threats to
civilization. On October 12-13, CRN Director of Research
Chris Phoenix took part in a program in Washington
DC sponsored by the group. Chris was invited to speak about “Threats to Society
from Nanotechnology.” The organization’s executive director
Kennette Benedict says:
“What we're doing is taking stock of the threats that might be catastrophic to
human societies.”
As well as the continuing danger of atomic weapons, new threats are being
investigated. Benedict says: "We're looking at new developments in life
sciences, in synthetic biology, for instance, and some of the emerging
technologies, nanotechnologies and how these may converge with life and
developments in biotechnologies, and at information technology and the
vulnerabilities of civilian infrastructure."
CRN at the Naval War College
On October 24, CRN Executive Director Mike Treder
met with a group of senior officers and affiliated civilian researchers at the
US Naval War College in
Newport, Rhode Island. Mike was invited to address the
Strategic Studies Group
on the subject of the disruptive potential of molecular manufacturing. The
wide-ranging three-hour conversation covered not just military applications, but
other societal implications as well.
Global Futures Strategist
We are pleased to announce the appointment of
Jamais Cascio as a
new Special Associate of CRN. Jamais, who
writes about the intersection of emerging technologies and cultural
transformation, and specializes in the design and creation of plausible
scenarios of the future, will serve as a Global Futures Strategist for CRN.
In 2003, Jamais co-founded the award-winning weblog
WorldChanging.com,
covering topics including energy and the environment, global development, open
source technologies, and catalysts for social change. His essays about
technology and society have appeared in a variety of publications, and he has
worked on a number of television, film, and game projects, including two books
for the science fiction game series
Transhuman Space.
New Zealand Gets Organized
As part of Mike Treder’s recent speaking tour of New
Zealand and Australia, he was
interviewed for a program on New Zealand’s national radio network. Fern
Evitt, a resident of Auckland, heard the program, was impressed, and decided to
attend Mike’s public presentation on September 14 in Auckland. That night, she
introduced herself to Mike and said she would like to support CRN’s work by
creating an organization in New Zealand for others who are interested in
learning more about the societal implications of advanced nanotechnology.
Fern Evitt has a background in international trade, marketing, and general
management, and is a member of the New Zealand Institute of Directors. We are quite pleased to have someone of Fern’s caliber making a
commitment to help CRN on a local basis. If you live in New Zealand and would
like to get involved, please contact her at
fernevitt@yahoo.com
Treder Speech for Download
A radio station in Nelson, New Zealand, recorded one of the 30-minute
presentations that Mike Treder made on his lecture tour.
They have posted (with our permission) the audio file on their website for
downloading. You may enjoy listening to it. Thanks, 'Fresh FM'!
CRN Goes to Brazil
Chris Phoenix, Director of Research for CRN, will give a talk in Brazil next
month at the
Third International Seminar on Nanotechnology, Society, and the Environment.
The event is November 6-10, and is sponsored by the University of Sao Paulo.
Chris will speak on the subject of nanotechnology and economics.
Books in the Works
Mike Treder and Chris Phoenix, the principals
of CRN, have been asked to contribute chapters for three new non-fiction books
that will cover nanotechnology and its implications. Nanoethics is being
compiled and edited by Patrick Lin; Global Catastrophic Risks by Nick
Bostrom and Milan Cirkovic; and Green Nanotech by Geoffrey Hunt.
In addition, Chris and Mike contributed to Worldchanging: A User's Guide for
the 21st Century, which is scheduled for publication on November 1. This
608-page book
includes chapters on Cities, Communities, Business, Politics, Shelter, and more.
And, yes, as we have often been asked, we are planning to write our own book.
It’s a big undertaking, but we’ll keep you informed as progress is made.
Feature Essay: Recycling Nano-Products
Chris Phoenix, Director of Research, Center for Responsible Nanotechnology
We are often asked, "How will nanofactory-built products be recycled?"
One of the advantages of molecular manufacturing is
that it will use very strong and high-performance materials. Most of them
probably will not be biodegradable. So what will save us from being buried in
nano-litter?
The first piece of good news is that nano-built products will use materials more
efficiently. Mechanical parts can be built mostly without defects, making them a
lot stronger than today's materials. Active components can be even more compact,
because scaling laws are advantageous to small machines: motors may have a
million times the power density, and computers may be a million times as
compact. So for equivalent functionality, nano-built products will use perhaps
100-1000 times less material. In fact, some products may be so light that they
have to be ballasted with water. (This would also make carbon-based products
fireproof.)
The second good news is that carbon-based products will burn once any water
ballast is removed. Traditionally, incineration has been a dirty way to dispose
of trash; heavy metals, chlorine compounds, and other nasty stuff goes up the
smokestack and pollutes wherever the wind blows. Fortunately, one of the first
products of molecular manufacturing will be efficient molecular sorting systems.
It will be possible to remove the harmless and useful gases from the combustion
products--perhaps using them to build the next products--and send the rest back
to be re-burned.
The third good news is that fewer exotic materials and elements should be
needed. Today's products use a lot of different substances for different jobs.
Molecular manufacturing, by contrast, will be able to implement different
functions by building different molecular shapes out of a much smaller set of
materials. For example, carbon can be either an insulator or a conductor, shapes
built of carbon can be both flexible or rigid, and carbon molecules can be
transparent (diamond) or opaque (graphite).
Finally, it may be possible to build many full-size products out of modular
building blocks: microscopic
nanoblocks
that might contain a billion atoms and provide flexible functionality. In
theory, rather than discarding and recycling a product, it could be pulled apart
into its constituent blocks, which could then be reassembled into a new product.
However, this may be impractical, since the nanoblocks would have to be
carefully cleaned in order to fit together precisely enough to make a reliable
product. But re-using rather than scrapping products is certainly a possibility
that's worth investigating further.
Not surprisingly, there is also some bad news. The first bad news is that carbon
is not the only possible material for molecular manufacturing. It is probably
the most flexible, but others have been proposed. For example, sapphire
(corundum, alumina) is a very strong crystal of aluminum oxide. It will not
burn, and alumina products probably will have to be scrapped into landfills if
their nanoblocks cannot be re-used. Of course, if we are still using industrial
abrasives, old nano-built products might simply be crushed and used for that
purpose.
The second bad news is that nano-built products will come in a range of sizes,
and some will be small enough that they will be easy to lose. Let me stress that
a nano-built product is not a grey goo robot, any more
than a toaster is. Tiny products may be sensors, computer nodes, or medical
devices, but they will have specialized functionality--not general-purpose
manufacturing capability. A lost product will likely be totally inert. But
enough tiny lost products could add up to an irritating dust.
The third bad news is that widespread use of personal
nanofactories will make it very easy and inexpensive to build stuff.
Although each product will use far less material than today's versions, we may
be using far more products.
Some readers may be wondering about "disassemblers" and whether they could be
used for recycling. Unfortunately, the "disassembler" described in Eric
Drexler's
Engines of Creation was a slow and energy-intensive research tool, not
an efficient way of taking apart large amounts of matter. It might be possible
to take apart old nano-products molecule by molecule, but it would probably be
less efficient than incinerating them.
Collecting products for disposal of is an interesting problem. Large products
can be handled one at a time. Small and medium-sized products might be enough of
a hassle to keep track of that people will be tempted to use them and forget
them. For example, networked sensors with one-year batteries might be scattered
around, used for two months, and then forgotten--better models would have been
developed long before the battery would wear out. In such cases, the products
might need to be collected robotically. Any product big enough to have an RFID
antenna would be able to be interrogated as to its age and when it was last
used. Ideally, it would also tell who its owner had been, so the owner could be
billed, fined, or warned as appropriate.
This essay has described what could be. Environmentally friendly cleanup and
disposal schemes will not be difficult to implement in most cases. However, as
with so much else about molecular manufacturing, the availability of good
choices does not mean that the best options necessarily will be chosen. It is
likely that profligate manufacturing and bad design will lead to some amount of
nano-litter. But the world will be very fortunate if nano-litter turns out to be
the biggest problem created by molecular
manufacturing.
C-R-Newsletter #45 September 30, 2006
CRN Down Under
CRN at MIT, LiveBlogging
CRN in Albany
Molecular Manufacturing “Idea
Factory” Funded
New Ideas for DNA
Construction
Molecular Manufacturing Video
Foresight Institute Awards
Feynman Prizes
Feature Essay: New
Opportunities for DNA Design
Every month is full of activity for CRN. To follow the latest
happenings on a daily basis, be sure to check our
Responsible Nanotechnology weblog.
==========
CRN Down Under
CRN’s Executive Director, Mike Treder, spent two
weeks in New Zealand and one week in Australia this month, giving numerous talks
on molecular manufacturing. Mike reports that he spoke to large audiences, and
that he encountered no skepticism about whether molecular manufacturing was
possible. In the middle of his busy schedule, Mike was able to blog his
experiences
here,
here,
here,
and
here.
The trip was covered by
ABC News. The article was a good summary of CRN’s message. At the end, they
included opinions from four scientists. None of the scientists asserted that
molecular manufacturing was impossible – a nice change from a few years ago,
when it seemed every article on any kind of nanotech had to end with some
scientist giving a bogus explanation of why it couldn’t possibly work. The
scientists did say that CRN’s timeline was too optimistic, prompting
this
blog post from our Director of Research, Chris
Phoenix.
CRN at MIT, LiveBlogging
On September 27 and 28, Mike attended the Emerging Technologies Conference at
MIT, and LiveBlogged it in eight articles, covering
Amazon.com,
online media,
innovation,
cheap
human genomes,
autonomous vehicles,
U.S.
technology level,
energy, and
anti-aging research.
CRN in Albany
Defying alphabetical order, Albany came between Australia and Boston on Mike’s
itinerary. He spoke at
Nanotechnology 2006, a two-day international conference September 25-26
hosted by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. The title of Mike’s talk was
“Fourth-Generation Nanotechnology: Disruptive Abundance.”
Molecular Manufacturing “Idea Factory” Funded
The UK’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) does
something they call “IDEAS Factory” which involves 20-30 interdisciplinary
researchers spending two days brainstorming on how to generate cutting-edge
research on an interesting topic.
An IDEAS factory has been announced to study “Software Control of Matter at the
Atomic or Molecular Scale.” The project description includes this statement:
“One route to this goal might be to take inspiration from 3D rapid prototyping
devices, and conceive of some kind of pick-and-place mechanism operating at the
atomic or molecular level, perhaps based on scanning probe techniques.” In
addition to hosting the brainstorming “sandbox,” 1.5 million GBP have been
earmarked for whatever research ideas are generated by this proposal.
For more details and technical commentary, see
our
blog, Richard Jones’s
Soft
Machines blog, or the
project website.
New Ideas for DNA Construction
CRN Research Director Chris Phoenix got inspired recently, thinking about the
possible molecular manufacturing implications of the new DNA design technique
that uses short, easily manufactured “staples” to stitch together a long, easily
obtained DNA strand into folds. Chris wrote several blog posts
here,
here,
and
here, and has made that the topic of this month’s
Feature Essay.
Molecular Manufacturing Video
The Society of Manufacturing Engineers has created a new video focused on
molecular manufacturing, as well as nanomanufacturing. The video is a series of
interviews with people working on various aspects. Although the video is not
free, SME has made a transcript available free on
their page, and Chris
reviewed it on our blog.
Foresight Institute Awards Feynman Prizes
Each year, Foresight Nanotech Institute awards Feynman Prizes for experimental
and theoretical work toward molecular manufacturing, as well as a Communication
Prize and a Distinguished Student award.
This year, the experimental and theoretical prizes were both awarded to the same
group – the team that invented the DNA stapling technique, Drs.
Erik Winfree
and Paul W.K.
Rothemund of Caltech.
The Communication prize was awarded to Dr. J. Storrs (Josh) Hall. Josh was a
longtime moderator of the sci.nanotech newsgroup, and recently the author of
Nanofuture: What's Next For
Nanotechnology.
The Distinguished Student award was received by
Berhane Temelso.
CRN congratulates all the prize winners for their excellent work.
Feature Essay: New Opportunities for DNA Design
Chris Phoenix, Director of Research, Center for Responsible Nanotechnology
DNA is a very versatile molecule, if you know how to use it. Of course, the
genetic material for all organisms (except some viruses) is made of DNA. But it
is also useful for building shapes and structures, and it is this use that is
most interesting to a nanotechnologist.
Readers familiar with DNA complementarity should skip this paragraph.
Non-technical readers should read my earlier
science essay on DNA folding. Briefly, DNA is made of four molecules,
abbreviated A, C, G, and T, in a long string (polymer). G and C attract each
other, as do A and T. A string with the sequence AACGC will tend to attach
itself to another string with the sequence GCGTT (the strings match
head-to-tail). Longer sequences attach more permanently. Heating up a mixture of
DNA makes the matched strings vibrate apart; slowly cooling a mixture makes the
strings reattach in (hopefully) their closest-matched configuration.
Until recently, designing a shape out of DNA was a painstaking process of
planning sequences that would match in just the right way – and none of the
wrong ways. Over the years, a number of useful design patterns were developed,
including ways to attach four strands of DNA side by side for extra stiffness;
ways to make structures that would contract or twist when a third strand was
added to bridge two strands in the structure; and three-way junctions between
strands, useful for building geometric shapes. A new structure or technique
would make the news every year or so. In addition to design difficulties, it was
hard to make sufficiently long error-free strands to form useful shapes.
A few months ago, a
new technique was invented by Dr. Paul Rothemund. Instead of building all
the DNA artificially for his shapes, he realized that half of it could be
derived from a high-quality natural source with a fixed but random sequence, and
the other half could be divided into short, easily synthesized pieces –
“staples” – with sequences chosen to match whatever sequence the natural strand
happens to have at the place the staple needs to attach. Although the random
strand will tend to fold up on itself randomly to some extent, the use of large
numbers of precisely-matching staples will pull it into the desired
configuration.
If a bit of extra DNA is appended to the end of a staple piece, the extra bit
will stick out from the shape. This extra DNA can be used to attach multiple
shapes together, or to grab on to a DNA-tagged molecule or particle. This
implies that DNA-shape structures can be built that include other molecules for
increased strength or stiffness, or useful features such as actuation.
Although the first shapes designed were planar, because planar shapes are easier
to scan with atomic force microscopes so as to verify what’s been built, the
stapling technique can also be used to pull the DNA strand into a
three-dimensional shape. So this implies that with a rather small design effort
(at least by the standards of a year ago), 3D structures built of DNA can be
constructed, with “Velcro” hanging off of them to attach them to other DNA
structures, and with other molecules either attached to the surface or embedded
in the interior.
The staple strands are short and easy to synthesize (and don’t need to be
purified), so the cost is quite low. According to page 81 of
Rothemund’s notes [PDF],
a single staple costs about $7.00 – for 80 nmol, or 50 quintillion molecules.
Enough different staples to make a DNA shape cost about $1,500 to synthesize.
The backbone strand costs about $12.50 per trillion molecules. Now, those
trillion molecules only add up to 4 micrograms. Building a human-scale product
out of that material would be far too costly. But a computer chip with only 100
million transistors costs a lot more than $12.50.
The goal that’s the focus of this essay is combining a lot of these molecular
“bricks” to build engineered heterogeneous structures with huge numbers of
atoms. In other words, rather than creating simple tilings of a few bricks,
stick them together in arbitrary computer-controlled patterns, constructs in
which every brick can be different and independently designed.
I was hoping that nano-manipulation robotics had advanced to the point where the
molecular shapes could be attached to large handles that would be grabbed and
positioned by a robot, making the brick go exactly where it’s wanted relative to
the growing construct, but I’m told that the state of the art probably isn’t
there yet. Just one of the many problems is that if you can’t sense the molecule
as you’re positioning it, you don’t know if temperature shifts have caused the
handle to expand or contract. However, there may be another way to do it.
An atomic force microscope (AFM) uses a small tip. With focused ion beam (FIB)
nano-machining, the tip can be hollowed out so as to form a pocket suitable for
a brick to nestle in. By depositing DNA Velcro with different sequences at
different places in the pocket (which could probably be done by coating the
whole tip, burning away a patch with the FIB, then depositing a different
sequence), it should be possible to orient the brick relative to the tip. (If
the brick has two kinds of Velcro on each face, and the tip only has one kind
deposited, the brick will stick less strongly to the tip than to its target
position.)
Now, the tip can be used for ordinary microscopy, except that instead of having
a silicon point, it will have a corner of the DNA brick. It should still be
usable to scan the construct, hopefully with enough resolution to tell where the
tip is relative to the construct. This would solve the nano-positioning problem.
I said above that the brick would have DNA Velcro sticking out all over. For
convenience, it may be desirable to have a lot of bricks of identical design,
floating around the construct – as long as they would not get stuck in places
they’re not wanted. This would allow the microscope tip to pick up a brick from
solution, then deposit it, then pick up another right away, without having to
move away to a separate “inkwell.” But why don’t the bricks stick to the
construct and each other, and if they don’t, then how can the tip deposit them,
and why do they stay where they’re put?
To make the bricks attach only when and where they’re put requires three
conditions. First, the Velcro should be designed to be sticky, so that the
bricks will stay firmly in place once attached. Second, the Velcro should be
capped with other DNA strands so that the bricks will not attach by accident.
Third, the capping strands should be designed so that physically pushing the
brick against a surface will weaken the bond between Velcro and cap, allowing
the Velcro to get free and bind to the target surface. For example, if the cap
strands stick stiffly out away from the block (perhaps by being bound to two
Velcro strands at once), then mechanical pressure will weaken the connection.
Mechanical pressure, of course, can be applied by an AFM. Scan with low force,
and when the brick is in the right place, press down with the microscope. Wait
for the cap strands to float away and the Velcro to pair up, and the brick is
deposited. With multiple Velcro strands between each brick, the chance of them
all coming loose at once and allowing the brick to be re-capped can be made
miniscule, especially since the effective concentration of Velcro strands would
be far higher than the concentration of cap strands. But before the brick was
pushed into place, the chance of all the cap strands coming loose at once also
would have been miniscule. (For any physicists reading this, thermodynamic
equilibrium between bound and free bricks still applies, but the transition rate
can be made even slower than the above concentration argument implies, since the
use of mechanical force allows an extremely high energy barrier. If the
mechanical force applied is 100 pN over 5 nm, that is 500 zJ, approximately the
dissociation energy of a C-C bond.)
So, it seems that with lots of R&D (but without a whole lot of DNA design), it
might be possible to stick DNA bricks (plus attached molecules) together in
arbitrary patterns, using an AFM. But an AFM is going to be pretty slow. It
would be nice to make the work go faster by doing it in parallel. My
NIAC project suggests a
way to do that.
The plan is to build an array of “towers” or “needles” out of DNA bricks. In the
tip of each one, put a brick-binding cavity. Use an AFM to build the first one
in the middle of a flat surface. Then use that to build a second and third
needle on an opposing surface. (One of the surfaces would be attached to a nano-positioner.)
Use those two towers to build a fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh on the first
surface. The number of towers could grow exponentially.
By the time this is working, there may be molecules available that can act as
fast, independently addressable, nanoscale actuators. Build a mechanism into
each tower that lets it extend or retract – just a nanometer or so. Now, when
the towers are used to build something, the user can select which bricks to
place and which ones to hold back. This means that different towers, all
attached to the same surface and moved by the same nano-positioner, can be doing
different things. Now, instead of an exponential number of identical designs, it
has become possible to build an exponential number of different designs, or to
work on many areas of a large heterogeneous design in parallel.
A cubic micron is not large by human standards, but it is bigger than most
bacteria. There would be about 35,000 DNA bricks in a cubic micron. If a brick
could be placed every fifteen seconds, then it would take a week to build a
cubic micron out of bricks. This seems a little fast for a single AFM that has
to bind bricks from solution, find a position, and then push the brick into
place, even if all steps were fully automated – but it might be doable with a
parallel array (either an array of DNA needles, or a multi-tip AFM). If every
brick were different, it would cost about $50 million for the staples, but of
course not every brick will be different. For 1,000 different bricks, it would
cost only about $1.5 million.
We will want the system to deposit any of a number of brick types in any
location. How to select one of numerous types? The simplest way is to make all
bricks bind to the same tip, then flush them through one type at a time. This is
slow and wasteful. Better to include several tips in one machine, and then flush
through a mixture of bricks that will each bind to only one tip. The best
answer, once really high-function bricks are available and you’re using
DNA-built tips instead of hollowed-out AFM tips, is to make the tips
reconfigurable by using fast internal actuators to present various combinations
of DNA strands for binding of various differently-tagged bricks.
I started by suggesting that a scanning probe microscope be used to build the
first construct. Self-assembly also could be used to build small constructs, if
you can generate enough distinct blocks. But you may not have to build hundreds
of different bricks to make them join in arbitrary patterns. Instead, build
identical bricks, and cap the Velcro strands with a second-level “Velcro
staple.” Start with a generic brick coated with Velcro – optionally, put a
different Velcro sequence on each side. Stir that together with strands that are
complementary to the Velcro at one end and contain a recognition pattern on the
other end. Now, with one generic brick and six custom-made Velcro staples, you
have a brick with a completely unique recognition pattern on each side. Do that
for a number of bricks, and you can make them bind together any way you want.
One possible problem with this is that DNA binding operations usually need to be
“annealed” – heated to a temperature where the DNA falls apart, then cooled
slowly. This implies that the Velcro-staple approach would need three different
temperature ranges: one to form the shapes, one to attach the staples, and one
to let the shapes join together.
The Velcro-staple idea might even be tested today, using only the basic
DNA-shape technology, with one low-cost shape and a few dozen very-low-cost
staples. Plus, of course, whatever analysis tools you’ll need to convince you
that you’re making what you think you’re making.
There is a major issue involved here that I have not yet touched on. Although
the DNA staple technique makes a high percentage of good shapes, it also makes a
lot of broken or incomplete shapes. How can the usable shapes be sorted from the
broken shapes? Incomplete shapes may be sorted out by chromatography. Broken
shapes might possibly be rejected by adding a fluorescence pair and using a cell
sorter to reject shapes that did not fluoresce properly. Another possibility, if
using a scanning probe microscope (as opposed to the “blind” multi-needle
approach) is to detect the overall shape of the brick by deconvolving it against
a known surface feature, and if an unwanted shape is found, heat the tip to make
it dissociate.
This is just a sketch of some preliminary ideas. But it does go to show that the
new DNA staple technology makes things seem plausible that would not have been
thinkable before it was developed.
C-R-Newsletter #44 August 28, 2006
Mike Treder on the BBC
CRN Goes to Tennessee
Existential Risks of
Nanotechnology
Nanomedicine Web Site
Sander Olson Interviews
CRN Goes Down Under
CRN Goes to Albany
Feature Essay: Military
Implications of Molecular Manufacturing
Every month is full of activity for CRN. To follow the latest
happenings on a daily basis, be sure to check our
Responsible Nanotechnology
weblog.
==========
Mike Treder on the BBC
Nanotechnology was the subject of the August 14, 2006, edition of BBC Radio’s
Business Daily, a program that “focuses on issues and trends, providing
context, reportage, debate, opinion, and in-depth interviews.” CRN Executive
Director Mike Treder was a
featured guest on the show, offering an overview of the benefits and risks
of advanced nanotechnology. The program was heard not only in the UK and in
Europe, but also in the US on National Public Radio.
CRN Goes to Tennessee
Last week, CRN’s Director of Research, Chris Phoenix,
traveled to Oak Ridge, Tennessee (USA) to speak at a conference titled “The
Next Industrial Revolution: Nanotechnology and Manufacturing.” The
conference was sponsored by the Society of
Manufacturing Engineers.
Chris's talk
was titled, "From Nanotechnology to Molecular Manufacturing," explaining to a
mostly-technical audience why molecular manufacturing will be very attractive to
develop, and touching on several pathways to development. The audience appeared
receptive. Two other speakers, Josh Hall and Tihamer Toth-Fejel, made molecular
manufacturing the focus of their remarks. Other speakers referred to it in
passing. Some were supportive and some were skeptical of the technical utility
of MM, but the skeptical ones spoke carefully and moderately about their doubts.
The
conference also included one talk on nanoparticle health risks by Charlene
Bayer, Principal Research Scientist at Georgia Tech Research Institute. Most of
her presentation consisted of explaining how much we don't know yet — and by
implication, how many risks might be waiting for us. She discussed pathways for
nanoparticles to enter the body and be transported inside it. Although the talk
was short on actual evidence for toxicity, she showed one very impressive slide,
showing the difference in immune system response to 21 nm vs. 250 nm TiO2
nanoparticles. Not only was the response an order of magnitude greater, but also
it lasted for many months.
Existential Risks of Nanotechnology
Nanomedicine Web Site
Sander Olson Interviews
Sander Olson
is one of the original developers of the NanoApex and NanoMagazine
web sites. Over the years, Sander has conducted numerous interviews with notable
figures working in or commenting on the field of nanotechnology. Since the
acquisition of his sites in 2005 by the International Small Technology Network,
many of Sander's interviews have not been available on the web. To correct this,
CRN has published a number of them on our site.
Recently added are interviews with Britt Gillette, Christine Peterson, Damien
Broderick, and several others. More will be posted in the weeks to come.
The Institution of
Professional Engineers New Zealand (IPENZ) has invited CRN Executive Director
Mike Treder to go on a speaking tour of 11 cities over two weeks, from September
2-14, 2006. The full
itinerary has just been posted on their web site, along with this
introduction:
Nanotechnology is the
engineering of tiny machines - the projected ability to build things from the
bottom up inside nanofactories, using techniques and tools being
developed today to make complete, highly advanced products. Shortly after this
envisioned molecular machinery is created, it will result in a manufacturing
revolution, probably causing severe disruption. It also has serious economic,
social, environmental, and military implications.
After New Zealand, Mike will
travel to Australia for a series of meetings and speaking events organized by
universities in Melbourne, Sydney, and Canberra, and made possible by
Nanotechnology Victoria.
CRN Goes to Albany
Immediately after returning from Australia and New Zealand, CRN’s Mike Treder
will go to Albany, New York, to speak at Nanotechnology 2006, a two-day
international conference September 25-26 hosted by Rensselaer Polytechnic
Institute. The title of Mike’s talk is “Fourth-Generation Nanotechnology:
Disruptive Abundance.”
Feature Essay: Military Implications of Molecular Manufacturing
Chris Phoenix, Director of Research, Center for Responsible Nanotechnology
(Originally published in the July 2006 issue of
NanoNews-Now -- reprinted by permission)
This essay
will survey the technology of molecular manufacturing, the basic capabilities of
its products, some possible weapon systems, some tactical and strategic
considerations, and some possible effects of molecular manufacturing on the
broader context of societies and nations. However, all of this discussion must
take place in the context of the underlying fact that the effects and outcome of
molecular manufacturing will be almost inconceivable, and certainly not
susceptible to shallow or linear analysis.
Take a
minute and try to imagine a modern battlefield without electricity. No radar or
radios; no satellites; no computers; no night vision, or even flashlights; no
airplanes, and few ground vehicles of any kind. Imagination is not sufficient to
generate this picture—it simply doesn't make sense to talk of a modern military
without electricity.
Molecular
manufacturing will have a similarly profound effect on near-future military
affairs.
Electricity
is a general-purpose energy technology, useful for applications from motors to
data processing. A few inventions, ramified and combined—the storage battery,
transistor, electromagnet, and a few others—are powerful enough to be necessary
components of almost all modern military equipment and activities.
If it is
impossible to conceive of a modern military without electricity—a technology
that exists, and the use of which we can study—it will be even less feasible to
try to imagine a military with molecular manufacturing.
Molecular
manufacturing will be the world's first general-purpose manufacturing
technology. Its products will be many times more plentiful, more intricate, and
higher performance than any existing product. They will be built faster and less
expensively, speeding research and development. They will cover a far greater
range of size, energy, and distance than today's weapons systems. As
increasingly powerful weapons make the battlefield untenable for human soldiers,
computers vastly more powerful and compact than today's will enable far higher
degrees of automation and remote operation. Kilogram-scale manufacturing
systems, building directly from the latest blueprints in minutes, will utterly
transform supply, logistics, and deployment.
Radium and
X-rays were discovered within months of each other. Within a few years, X-rays
had inspired stories about military uses of “death rays.” Decades later, Madame
Curie gave speeches on the wonderful anti-cancer properties of radium. It would
have been difficult or impossible to predict that a few decades after that,
X-rays would be a ubiquitous medical technology, and nuclear radiation would be
the basis of the world's most horrific weapons. While reading the rest of this
article, keep in mind that the implications of various molecular manufacturing
products and capabilities will be at least as unpredictable and
counterintuitive.
Technical Basis of Molecular
Manufacturing
At its
foundation, molecular manufacturing works by doing a few precise fabrication
operations, very rapidly, at the molecular level, under computer control. It can
thus be viewed as a combination of mechanical engineering and chemistry, with
some additional help from rapid prototyping, automated assembly, and related
fields of research.
Atoms and
inter-atomic bonds are completely precise: every atom of a type is identical to
every other, and there are only a few types. Barring an identifiable error in
fabrication, two molecules manufactured according to the same blueprint will be
identical in structure and shape (with transient variations of predictable scale
due to thermal noise and other known physical effects). This consistency will
allow fully automated fabrication. Computer controlled addition of molecular
fragments, creating a few well-characterized bond types in a multitude of
selected locations, will enable a vast range of components to be built with
extremely high reliability. Building with reliable components, higher levels of
structure can retain the same predictability and engineerability.
A
fundamental “scaling law” of physics is that small systems operate faster than
large systems. Moving at moderate speed over tiny distances, a nanoscale
fabrication system could perform many millions of operations per second,
creating products of its own mass and complexity in hours or even minutes. Along
with faster operation comes higher power density, again proportional to the
shrinkage: nanoscale machines might be a million times more compact than today's
technology. Computers would shrink even more profoundly, and non-electronic
technologies already analyzed could dissipate enough less power to make the
shrinkage feasible. Although individual nanoscale machines would have small
capacity, massive arrays could work together; it appears that gram-scale
computer and motor systems, and ton-scale manufacturing systems, preserving
nanoscale performance levels, can be built without running afoul of scaling laws
or other architectural constraints including cooling. Thus, products will be
buildable in a wide range of sizes.
A complete
list of advantages and capabilities of molecularly manufactured products, much
less an analysis of the physical basis of the advantages, would be beyond the
scope of this paper. But several additional advantages should be noted.
Precisely fabricated covalent materials will be much stronger than materials
formed by today's imprecise manufacturing processes. Precise, well-designed,
covalently structured bearings should suffer neither from wear nor from static
friction (stiction). Carbon can be an excellent conductor, an excellent
insulator, or a semiconductor, allowing a wide range of electrical and
electronic devices to be built in-place by a molecular manufacturing system.
Development of Molecular Manufacturing
Although its
capabilities will be far-reaching, the development of molecular manufacturing
may require a surprisingly small effort. A finite, and possibly small, number of
deposition reactions may suffice to build molecular structures with programmable
shape—and therefore, diverse and engineerable function. High-level architectures
for integrated kilogram-scale arrays of nanoscale manufacturing systems have
already been worked out in some detail. Current-day tools are already able to
remove and deposit atoms from selected locations in covalent solids. Engineering
of protein and other biopolymers is another pathway to molecularly precise
fabrication of engineered nanosystem components. Analysis tools, both physical
and theoretical, are developing rapidly.
As a general
rule, nanoscale research and development capabilities are advancing in
proportion to Moore's Law—even faster in some cases. Conceptual barriers to
developing molecular manufacturing systems are also falling rapidly. It seems
likely that within a few years, a program to develop a nanofactory will be
launched; some observers believe that one or more covert programs may already
have been launched. It also seems likely that, within a few years of the first
success, the cost of developing an independent capability will have dropped to
the point where relatively small groups can tackle the project. Without
stringent and widespread restrictions on technology, it most likely will not be
possible to prevent the development of multiple molecular manufacturing systems
with diverse owners.
Products of Molecular Manufacturing
All
exploratory engineering in the field to date has pointed to the same set of
conclusions about molecular manufacturing-built products:
1.
Manufacturing systems can build more manufacturing systems.
2. Small
products can be extremely compact.
3.
Human-scale products can be extremely inexpensive and lightweight.
4. Large
products can be astonishingly powerful.
If a
self-contained manufacturing system can be its own product, then manufacturing
systems can be inexpensive—even non-scarce. Product cost can approach the cost
of the feedstock and energy required to make it (plus licensing and regulatory
overhead). Although molecular manufacturing systems will be extremely portable,
most products will not include one—it will be more efficient to manufacture at a
dedicated facility with installed feedstock, energy, and cooling supplies.
The feature
size of nanosystems will probably be about 1 nanometer (nm), implying a million
features in a bacteria-sized object, a billion features per cubic micron, or a
trillion features in the volume of a ten-micron human cell. A million features
is enough to implement a simple CPU, along with sensors, actuators, power
supply, and supporting structure. Thus, the smallest robots may be
bacteria-sized, with all the scaling law advantages that implies, and a medical
system (or weapon system based thereon) could be able to interact with cells and
even sub-cellular structures on an equal footing. (See
Nanomedicine Vol. I:
Basic Capabilities for further exploration.)
As a general
rule of thumb, human-scale products may be expected to be 100-1000 times lighter
than today's versions. Covalent carbon-based materials such as buckytubes should
be at least 100 times stronger than steel, and materials could be used more
efficiently with more elegant construction techniques. Active components will
shrink even more. (Of course, inconveniently light products could be ballasted
with water.)
Large
nanofactories could build very large products, from spacecraft to particle
accelerators. Large products, like smaller ones, could benefit from stronger
materials and from active systems that are quite compact. Nanofactories should
scale to at least ton-per-hour production rates for integrated products, though
this might require massive cooling capacity depending on the sophistication of
the nanofactory design.
Possible Weapons Systems
The smallest
systems may not be actual weapons, but computer platforms for sensing and
surveillance. Such platforms could be micron-scale. The power requirement of a
1-MIPS computer might be on the order of 10-100 pW; at that rate, a cubic micron
of fuel might last for 100-1000 seconds. The computer itself would occupy
approximately one cubic micron.
Very small
devices could deliver fatal quantities of toxins to unprotected humans.
Even the
smallest ballistic projectiles (bullets) could contain supercomputers, sensors,
and avionics sufficient to guide them to targets with great accuracy. Flying
devices could be quite small. It should be noted that small devices could
benefit from a process of automated design tuning; milligram-scale devices could
be built by the millions, with slight variations in each design, and the best
designs used as the basis for the next “generation” of improvements; this could
enable, for example, UAV's in the laminar regime to be developed without a full
understanding of the relevant physics. The possibility of rapid design is far
more general than this, and will be discussed below.
The line
between bullets, missiles, aircraft, and spacecraft would blur. With lightweight
motors and inexpensive manufacturing, a vehicle could contain a number of
different disposable propulsion systems for different flight regimes. A
“briefcase to orbit” system appears feasible, though such a small device might
have to fly slowly to conserve fuel until it reached the upper atmosphere. It
might be feasible to use 1 kg of airframe (largely discarded) and 20 kg of fuel
(not counting oxidizer) to place 1 kg into orbit; some of the fuel would be used
to gather and liquify oxygen in the upper atmosphere for the rocket portion of
its flight. (Engineering studies have not yet been done for such a device, and
it might require somewhat more fuel than stated here.)
Advanced
construction could produce novel energy-absorbing materials involving
high-friction mechanical slippage under high stress via micro- or nano-scale
mechanical components. In effect, every molecule would be a shock absorber, and
the material could probably absorb mechanical energy until it was destroyed by
heat.
New kinds of
weapons might be developed more quickly with rapid inexpensive fabrication. Many
classes of device will be buildable monolithically. For example, a new type of
aircraft or even spacecraft might be tested an order of magnitude more rapidly
and inexpensively, reducing the cost of failure and allowing further
acceleration in schedule and more aggressive experimentation. Although materials
and molecular structures would not encompass today's full range of manufactured
substances, they could encompass many of the properties of those substances,
especially mechanical and electrical properties. This may enable construction of
weapons such as battlefield lasers, rail guns, and even more exotic
technologies.
Passive
armor certainly could not stop attacks from a rapid series of impacts by
precisely targeted projectiles. However, armor could get a lot smarter,
detecting incoming attacks and rapidly shifting to interpose material at the
right point. There may be a continuum from self-reconfiguring armor, to armor
that detaches parts of itself to hurl in the path of incoming attacks, to armor
that consists of a detached cloud of semi-independent counterweapons.
A new class
of weapon for wide-area destruction is kinetic impact from space. Small
impactors would be slowed by the atmosphere, but medium-to-large asteroids,
redirected onto a collision course, could destroy many square miles. The attack
would be detectable far in advance, but asteroid deflection and destruction
technology is not sufficiently advanced at this time to say whether a defender
with comparable space capacity could avoid being struck, especially if the
asteroid was defended by the attacker. Another class of space impactor is
lightweight solar sails accelerated to a respectable fraction of light speed by
passage near the sun. These could require massive amounts of inert shielding to
stop; it is not clear whether or not the atmosphere would perform this function
adequately.
A
hypothetical device often associated with molecular manufacturing is a small,
uncontrolled, exponentially self-replicating system. However, a self-replicating
system would not make a very good weapon. In popular conception, such a system
could be built to use a wide range of feedstocks, deriving energy from oxidizing
part of the material (or from ambient light), and converting the rest into
duplicate systems. In practice, such flexibility would be quite difficult to
achieve; however, a system using a few readily available chemicals and bypassing
the rest might be able to replicate itself—though even the simplest such system
would be extremely difficult to design. Although unrestrained replication of
inorganic systems poses a theoretical risk of widespread biosphere destruction
through competition for resources—the so-called “grey goo” threat—it seems
unlikely that anyone would bother to develop grey goo as a weapon, even a
doomsday deterrent. It would be more difficult to guide than a biological
weapon. It would be slower than a device designed simply to disrupt the physical
structure of its target. And it would be susceptible to detection and cleanup by
the defenders.
Tactics
A detailed
analysis of attack and defense is impossible at this point. It is not known
whether sensor systems will be able to effectively detect and repel an
encroachment by small, stealthy robotic systems; it should be noted that the
smallest such systems might be smaller than a wavelength of visible light,
making detection at a distance problematic. It is unknown whether armor will be
able to stop the variety of penetrating objects and forces that could be
directed at it. Semi-automated R&D may or may not produce new designs so quickly
that the side with the better software will have an overwhelming advantage. The
energy cost of construction has only been roughly estimated, and is uncertain
within at least two orders of magnitude; active systems, including airframes for
nano-built weapons, will probably be cost-effective in any case, but passive or
static systems including armor may or may not be worth deploying.
Some things
appear relatively certain. Unprotected humans, whether civilian or soldier, will
be utterly vulnerable to nano-built weapons. In a scenario of interpenetrating
forces, where a widespread physical perimeter cannot be established, humans on
both sides can be killed at will unless protected at great expense and
inconvenience. Even relatively primitive weapons such as hummingbird-sized
flying guns with human target recognition and poisoned bullets could make an
area unsurvivable without countermeasures; the weight of each gun platform would
be well under one gram. Given the potential for both remote and semi-autonomous
operation of advanced robotics and weapons, a force with a developed molecular
manufacturing capability should have no need to field soldiers; this implies
that battlefield death rates will be low to zero for such forces.
A concern
commonly raised in discussions of nanotech weapons is the creation of new
diseases. Molecular manufacturing seems likely to reduce the danger of this.
Diseases act slowly and spread slowly. A sufficiently capable bio-sensor and
diagnostic infrastructure should allow a very effective and responsive
quarantine to be implemented. Rapid testing of newly manufactured treatment
methods, perhaps combined with metabolism-slowing techniques to allow additional
R&D time, could minimize disease even in infected persons
Despite the
amazing power and flexibility of molecular manufactured devices, a lesson from
World War I should not be forgotten: Dirt makes a surprisingly effective shield.
It is possible that a worthwhile defensive tactic would be to embed an item to
be protected deeply in earth or water. Without active defenses, which would also
be hampered by the embedding material, this would be at best a delaying tactic.
Information
is likely to be a key determiner of military success. If, as seems likely,
unexpected offense with unexpected weapons can overwhelm defense, then rapid
detection and analysis of an attacker's weapons will be very important.
Information-gathering systems are likely to survive more by stealth than by
force, leading to a “spy vs. spy” game. To the extent that this involves
destruction of opposing spy-bots, it is similar to the problem of defending
against small-scale weapons. Note that except for the very smallest systems, the
high functional density of molecularly constructed devices will frequently allow
both weapon and sensor technology to be piggybacked on platforms primarily
intended for other purposes.
It seems
likely that, with the possible exception of a few small, fiercely defended
volumes, a robotic battleground would consist of interpenetrated forces rather
than defensive lines (or defensive walls). This implies that any non-active
matter could be destroyed with little difficulty unless shielded heavily enough
to outlast the battle.
Strategy
As implied
above, a major strategy is to avoid putting soldiers on the battlefield via the
use of autonomous or remotely operated weapons. Unfortunately, this implies that
an enemy wanting to damage human resources will have to attack either civilian
populations or people in leadership positions. To further darken the picture,
civilian populations will be almost impossible to protect from a determined
attack without maintaining a near-hermetic seal around their physical location.
Since the resource cost of such a shield increases as the shield grows (and the
vulnerability and unreliability probably also increase), this implies that
civilians under threat will face severe physical restrictions from their own
defenders.
A
substantial variety of attack mechanisms will be available, including kinetic
impact, cutting, sonic shock and pressure, plasma, electromagnetic beam,
electromagnetic jamming and EMP, heat, toxic or destructive chemicals, and
perhaps more exotic technologies such as particle beam and relativistic
projectile. A variety of defensive techniques will be available, including
camouflage, small size, physical avoidance of attack, interposing of sacrificial
mass, jamming or hacking of enemy sensors and computers, and preemptive strike.
Many of these offensive and defensive techniques will be available to devices
across a wide range of sizes. As explored above, development of new weapon
systems may be quite rapid, especially if automated or semi-automated design is
employed.
In addition
to the variety of physical modes of attack and defense, the cyber sphere will
become an increasingly important and complex battleground, as weapon systems
increasingly depend on networking and computer control. It remains to be seen
whether a major electronic security breach might destroy one side's military
capacity, but with increasing system complexity, such an occurrence cannot be
ruled out.
Depending on
what is being defended, it may or may not be possible to prepare an efficient
defense for all possible modes of attack. If defense is not possible, then the
available choices would seem to be either preemptive strike or avoidance of
conflict. Defense of civilians, as stated above, is likely to be difficult to
impossible. Conflict may be avoided by deterrence only in certain cases—where
the opponent has a comparable amount to lose. In asymmetric situations, where
opponents may have very different resources and may value them very differently,
deterrence may not work at all. Conflict may also be avoided by reducing the
sources of tension
Broader Context
Military
activity does not take place in isolation. It is frequently motivated by
non-military politics, though warlords can fight simply to improve their
military position. Molecular manufacturing will be able to revolutionize
economic infrastructures, creating material abundance and security that may
reduce the desire for war—if it is distributed wisely.
It appears
that an all-out war between molecular manufacturing powers would be highly
destructive of humans and of natural resources; the objects of protection would
be destroyed long before the war-fighting ability of the enemy. In contrast, a
war between molecular manufacturing and a conventionally armed power would
probably be rapid and decisive. The same is true against a nuclear power that
was prevented from using its nuclear weapons, either by politics or by
anti-missile technologies. Even if nuclear weapons were used, the
decentralization allowed by self-contained exponentially manufacturing
nanofactories would allow survival, continued prosecution of the war, and rapid
post-war rebuilding.
The line
between policing and military action is increasingly blurred. Civilians are
becoming very effective at attacking soldiers. Meanwhile, soldiers are
increasingly expected to treat civilians under occupation as citizens (albeit
second-class citizens) rather than enemy. At least in the US, paramilitary
organizations (both governmental and commercial) are being deployed in internal
civilian settings, such as the use of SWAT teams in some crime situations, and
Blackwater in post-Katrina New Orleans.
Many
molecular manufactured weapon systems will be useable for policing. Several
factors will make the systems desirable for police activity: a wide range of
weapon effects and intensities to choose from; less risk to police as
telepresence is employed; maintaining parity with increasingly armed criminals;
and increased deterrence due to increased information-gathering and
surveillance. This means that even without military conflict, a variety of
military-type systems will be not only developed, but also deployed and used.
It is
tempting to think that the absence of nuclear war after six decades of nuclear
weapons implies that we know how to handle insanely destructive weapons.
However, a number of factors will make molecular manufacturing arms races less
stable tha
