The rapidly advancing science is forecast to transform society

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/science...9-1n12nano.html

In a sleek UCSD laboratory, physicist Ivan Schuller is developing sensors for chemical and biological weapons – instruments so tiny that millions will fit on a chip the size of a postage stamp.

At the nearby Burnham Institute, also in La Jolla, Erkki Ruoslahti is testing microscopic spheres that act like guided missiles, carrying chemotherapy drugs to a cancer tumor.

The rapidly advancing science of things incredibly minute stands to change everything – the clothing people wear, the houses in which they live, the cars they drive, the medicines they take, the foods they eat, the computers they use and much more.

"Nanotechnology truly will bring a revolution in technology and industry," said Mihail Roco, senior adviser for nanotechnology at the National Science Foundation.

It will transform society faster than the computer industry and pervade daily life in obvious and subtle ways, Roco said. By 2015, he predicts, more than half of all new products will come from nanotechnology. Many people regard nanotechnology as the driver of a second industrial revolution.

In the future, some of the most dramatic advances might include wireless computers and video screens embedded in eyeglasses, as well as minuscule machines that can assemble themselves to achieve tasks.

He has developed sensors made from particles of silicon he calls "smart dust." Like flecks of living room dust that float in a beam of sunlight, Sailor's smart dust can flood an area. But here's the key difference: Smart dust has been engineered to reflect different colors of light when exposed to particular chemicals, such as sarin gas

Many scientists working with nanotechnology said they are most excited by how the field will transform the medical world.

When applied to treatment of diseases, such knowledge might allow researchers to target cancer cells with unprecedented precision, said Ruoslahti, the cancer researcher at the Burnham Institute.

Unlike conventional chemotherapy, the nano-particles that Ruoslahti is developing are projected to carry a small molecule that will attach itself – and its drug cargo – only to blood vessels that feed cancer tumors.

The anticipated pervasiveness of nanotechnology in coming years has worried some people. Some scientists believe that newly made materials could become dangerous to human health and the environment.

For instance, it's unclear how toxic some nano-particles might be to human health. The large surface area of nano-particles, relative to their overall size, increases their toxicity when inhaled. They can penetrate deep into the lungs and may move to the brain, liver and other parts of the body.

Some worry that nano-particles in the wrong hands could be used as terrorist weapons.

"We have to develop ways to deal with unexpected consequences"

No more transformations! You'll bring us all to ruin, gloom, and doom!

Stop trying to scare!

Sorry

I just find this incredibly interesting stuff, Since im actually going to be taking courses on Nanotech, I like to show people what it really is. its not some evil nano robots thats gonna take over the world. It will really help us, in many ways.

It will also destroy and deprive us in many ways.

Sure it may make life more easier and smoother by the physical sense,
But how does nanotech bring happiness and improvement?

Would you rather have a tree or a factory in your backyard?

Nanotech cure cancer = Happiness
Nanotech cure AIDS = Happiness
Nanotech save peoples lives = Happiness

Nanotech help poor people = happiness + improvement
Nanotech clear up the air and enviornment = happiness + improvement

nanotech to make things cheaper = improvement and happiness
Nanotech to make dreams come true = happiness

I dont know where u are getting your info from

The cure is to stop hanging around high levels of radiation!
The cure is stop having sex so much and with so many different partners!
Great. But also kill and damage more lives than it saves.

What? Nanotechnology will imprint benevolence and generosity into peoples heads, and completely erase greed?
Wasn't it clean in the first place? Sure will clean up the environment, clean it up well from all that it will need.


Well Hurrah, Sorry, But everything that is great, Is already cheap! Music, Poetry, Shade etc...
False and flawed dreams.

Have fun with your factory, Mr. Whoa182.

Nanotech will create less factories, alot less polution, and a cleaner environment for everyone throughout the world.
You're simply trying to find bad things in items where there are none. Smell the 20th century roses Athenian.

Every new technology has created more factories and pollution.

We shall see if Nanotech will screw humanity over, All we can do is watch now.

And for heavens sake! The millenium was 5 years ago! Its the 21stCentury!

Yup. But you're living in a 19th century world, you need to be aware of what technology has given us in the 20th century, before you can comprehend the good we will see in the 21st.

The simple fact of the matter is that this tech will benefit every living human being, and if you're against that then, well, for starters you shouldn't be using a computer.

That is so stupid on so many levels. What should we do - stay indoors the rest of our lives. Cancer can strike anyone




How would you know that for sure




There will be no greed if money becomes useless since theoretically nanotechnology can create anything out of nothing




well, it'll clean oil spills, toxic waste, garbage etc




Well, those were never on a microscopic level...and i doubt nanobots will run on petrol

Another point Athenian, sex is not the only way to contract aids.

It is the reason it is an epidemic.


Stop building nuclear power plants, Stop smoking, Stop flying at high altitudes, Stop going to tan salons, etc...
No need to avoid going outside.
Cancer will strike anyone who becomes vulnerable to it.

yes thats right, by manipulating atoms you could create anything you want.

the explosion of nanotechnology will allow tiny microscopic computers to perform what seems like pure magic, quickly creating everything from rockets to diamond rings seemingly out of thin air, by combining elemental particles--found more or less everywhere in air and soil--and cheaply assembling any desired product.

- Bill joy

So you could just create some food by putting together the atoms in the correct order



It doesnt break the laws of physics. Computer SIMULATIONS shows that it works Great. Over time it will get easier to build and will not cost as much money is it would do now because by 10-20 years time all the basic and some advanced resaerch will have been done.

With something like this you could just use a program like CAD and download the instructions to build a ferrari... an hour later, there is your ferrari


MNT - http://www.foresight.org/guidelines/current.html

I *heart* BurnSide.

Yeah, nanotech is definatly the future. Now, does anyone know the symbols to any open nanotech companies? =D

Anthenian, are you amish? Nanotechnology will only help our society. What are you getting at?

damn amish lol

Here, here! But they do have really good food =D

I'm with Athenian here. Sure, nanotech MIGHT help solve some of earth's problems, if it's applied correctly, but the best answer is to reduce the damage at its source.

Pollution: have nanothech devices clean up pollution? - GREAT! But how about NOT POLLUTING in the first place? How? GREATLY reduce the amount of energy we use! How? NEVER BUY SUVs!!! Drive small efficient cars, if you must drive. Better yet, take the bus or the train. Even better, ride a bicycle! Knowing what we do about our poor, crowded, injured planet, anyone who buys an SUV commits an act of evil. (By the way, statistics show that the odds of being maimed or killed in an SUV are slightly higher than being maimed or killed in a car because SUVs are less maneuverable and are much more likely to roll over than cars. The SUV sellers are lying when they hype SUVs as being safer than cars. SUVs are not safer).

Own a small home instead of a mansion. Heat the rooms you need to live in rather than the entire home.

Act toward your fellow humans with utmost kindness and consideration as if this is the only planet we'll ever get to use. Guess what? This IS the only planet we'll ever get to use! We won't terraform Mars in time to save humanity from our own greed. Technology won't save us. Only our own restraint of our greed and stupidity will save humanity from extinction.

"There will be no greed if money becomes useless since theoretically nanotechnology can create anything out of nothing"
I grew up on sci-fi from the 50s and 60s. Many stories predicted that by the 1980s robots would do all the work and all humans would live in luxury and leisure. Sorry, my job hasn't gotten easy. I'm working more than ever before just to keep up. Nanotech "could" make life wonderful for everyone but then again robots were supposed to do the same long ago. Didn't happen.
Money will stick around for as long as capitalism rules most of the planet.

"It doesnt break the laws of physics. Computer SIMULATIONS shows that it works Great. Over time it will get easier to build and will not cost as much money is it would do now because by 10-20 years time all the basic and some advanced resaerch will have been done."
Thirty-fourty years ago the same things were being said about robots. Didn't happen.

"Yup. But you're living in a 19th century world, you need to be aware of what technology has given us in the 20th century, before you can comprehend the good we will see in the 21st."
Even in the 19th century the air was foul from the industrial nations. Let's go back to the 18th century when the planet's air and water were still clean. Humans DON'T have to kill their planet with filth. Only the rich people creating markets work to convince you that you need to have machines running your lives. Live small. Live among humans with love and kindness. Giant factories make lots of cheap goods but they destroy quiet beaches and clean skies. Technology can solve some local problems but it's terrible for running the entire planet.

"Anthenian, are you amish? Nanotechnology will only help our society."
WOW! Such optimism!!!

They will eliminate polition both by cleaning it and by producing less themselves. It is snapping pollution at the source - when things are made with nanotech, this process will produce less pollution.



I agree that unmitigated use of SUVs is bad. Some people need them, though - to haul things. SUVs are, indeed safer than cars in head on collisions. The fact is that they get in more collisions, because they are less manuverable, not that they are less safe in the event of a collision.



I can see the heat thing, but what does owning a small home or a masion have anything to do with anything? Homes don't pollute with anything but overuse of energy - which in any size home could happen, not just mansions.



I agree.



Mars will be terraformed in time for use. Even if there was a nuclear, or nano war, not everyone would die. There would be some prominent people that would still be saved and would live on, and thus carry on humaity.



I didn't agree with the inital post - and it is true that nanotechnology may not reach its peak yet. It is also true that robots havn't reached their peak yet, though. Just because it's not here year doesn't mean it won't be here at all. A simple miscalculation of time is all.



Yes, but there has already been successful nano technology. Read up in the thread for articles. Nanotechnology is already around us - the thing that is not, yet around us are replicators using nanotechnology.




I agree for the most part, and this is why I support nanotechnology. It will help the planet. Damage is already done. The difference between you and I is that you say "Well, we shouldn't have done that". I say "We shouldn't have done that, but we did. Now we have a way to correct it and keep it correct. Go for it!"



It won't just help our society. Everything has both benefits and downfalls. But it will contribute more good than bad, because bad can always be combated.

On a final note, even if you're against nanotechnology, it's the wave of the future. How are you going to stop it?

The thing that scares me the most is the question that can be applied to any emergin technology:

'What if it got into the wrong hands?'

Instead of breathing in anthrax er chemical gas, why not just breath in thousands of nano-bots programmed to rip up ur organs er perform sum horrific procedures to ur brain tissue? Creating sumthin outta nuthin? So terrorists can mass-produce nukes, tanks and whole armies with this technology? jesus ppl it's scary shyt..just absolutely absurd to introduce sumthin like this into the world..one country nabs it, the rest of the planet is skrewed beyond belief imho..

- Dark

Yes, and I'm sure that there will also be a deconstruction device, which will tear things down to atomic form.

So we could have a nuke shot at us, and with this deconstruction device make it into a nuce fluffy teddy bear.

lmao yea I can picture that:

They build a nuke, we deconstruct it, their bots try and bring it back, our bots take it apart, their bots try and reconstruct it, and so on and so on lol

Meh, twil be interesting to see what happens..

- Dark

lol, that would be nerve racking, but hilarious.

blue bots vs red =/

yeah ok, its taken a bit longer it supposed to have, but everyone didnt make the same predictions!

As you know computer hardware is getting faster enabling the robots to do many kinds of things that just were not possible before. Computers will reach the speed and capacity of the human brain by around 2020 and then they will litrually soar past us.

Infact, Robots in the next 3-5 years will be common in peoples home. yes they may be simple but believe me, they will be here in the very near future. You might be aware of a little robot named ROBOSAPIEN. He was the number 1 sellar at christmas time and Robosapien 2 has man more things it can do and will be available this year.


A robot in every home?

One of the major producers of pollution come from the oil refineries. Sure we could just ride our bikes, like you said, but only a fraction of the oil we have is used for fuel. Plastics is the major use of oil. But how are you going to avoid using plastic. You can't say ride your bike - plastic is everywhere.
Factories cause alot of the pollution but there will always be pollution if that factory is going to create a product that is everywhere. So you can't avoid the pollution

Whoa182, who are teh primary developers of these technologies? And where does the research funding come from? A lot of such revolutionary technologies were first spotted and developed by the military, kept classified and only later released for civilian use - is this going to happen with nanotech?

Well the military is also looking into nanotech and will move down that road, if there is any breakthroughs in like making people invisible by using nanotech them of course it will be secret/classified for quite a while, but the actual technology will be released not long after because many companies will find it is easy to do.

Nanotech is not just for rich, its not just for the military... it will affect every person living on this earth in more ways that one!

Primary developers of nanotechnology

Well there are hundreds, if not thousands of companies already... most will go out of business but some will lead the market and be the next microsoft.

But you have all the multi billion dollar companies researching nanotech so there is plenty of money going into this field. I think spending on nanotech in 2004 was around $8.6 Billion

spending is going up every year too!

Every business will be affected by nanotech too, it doesnt matter what type

Food and water
Electrical equipment / energy
Clothes
Materials
Robotics
Computers
Jewelry / diomand market
Farming
Manufacturers
Cleaning business not exist anymore - ( sorry cleaners )
Medicine
Human Life-Span
Amimals life span
Health longevity
it Will effect society and radicly change how we live
Everything or most things will become automated
space travel becomes cheap

Everything will become more effiecient... So you could like charge up your laptop battery or mobile just by walking past something and it will be almost instantly charged. you can get T-shirts that are as flexible as normal but turn into something like 20 x stronger than pure steel when the bullet hits.

Also its a fast moving field because EVERY DAY breakthroughs are happening

As per the robot comment:

What about furbies?

I mean, yeah, they're crappy robots, but they are robots nonetheless, and during the craze millions were bought. (then again they could have been bought to blow up =P)

Yup, nanotechnology will even make Robots smarter with greater skills.

So far a larger version of robosapien would be that of Honda's Robot called Asimo.

I can't wait to see what the next robosapien will do and look like.

There is a better version of ASIMO now.. and theres videos of him http://world.honda.com/ASIMO/