UK researchers have developed a tiny turbine composed of nested carbon nanotubes. Even though the design is currently only theoretical, many uses having already been suggested for the nanoscale rotor, including in a novel kind of computer memory. The researchers have also suggested that the turbine could be used in a sort of “inkjet” printer for nanofabrication.
But there are possibilities beyond spraying nanoparticles on a surface. If arms were attached to two counter-rotating turbines, then they could be used to forcefully bring molecular components together—mechanosynthesis. It’s probably not possible to make diamondoid structures this way, but there are plenty of other things you could make. After all, we know that this is possible on some level because it’s very similar to how cells form the high energy bond in ATP.
The recent discussion on infrastructure at Futurismic got me thinking about how cities will and won’t change over the next century. The network hydrology idea, in particular, is very interesting, especially the concept art that so strikingly juxtaposes very alien-looking aquaculture towers with the bay bridge. The problem is that infrastructure is expensive but not profitable, so it’s left to the government. Not exactly known for radical projects, are they?
Cities of the future will look like the cities of today—roads, houses, and boxy office buildings—just as our modern cities look like the cities of the past. There are differences, obviously, but the differences going forward will be less than the differences looking back. A city of today will have more in common with itself fifty years in the future than with itself fifty years in the past. This is due to infrastructure inertia—the total value of current infrastructure, the cost of upgrading that infrastructure, and the lack of market forces to make those upgrades.
Nonetheless, radical ideas have a place and spark discussion. Certainly we need to consider how to we can adapt to our changing environment as well as adapting our immediate surroundings to suit our needs. It’s much better than building a bunch of levees and hoping nothing goes wrong.
As human civilization around the planet shifts more and more to urban, rather than rural, living, the problems facing city planners and officials mount. It’s clear that the solutions of the past—adding more lanes to the highways and expanding into the countryside—just won’t work. Architects in Beijing have already built an enclosed mini-city connected with elevated walkways. In the Netherlands, city planners are building houses that can float, so they rise with flood waters rather than being damaged.
More radically, there are arcology concepts like the Ultima Tower [hat tip: Futurismic]. These projects have a shocking price tag, but they may be more reasonable if they were financed and built a piece at a time, much like a traditional city. Short-term steeping stones to the mega-city are projects like Dongtan, which aims to build a “green” city with a population of half a million. Will we ever develop the will, as a society, to finance and construct new cities like this? What will future cities be like? Let me have your ideas in the comments.
When science fiction is at its best, it’s about much more than spaceships and rayguns. It’s about ideas. It’s about what it means to be human. That’s why I love Gattaca so much: it’s basically a story about the fact that our greaest limitations are the ones we place on ourselves. Sometimes, however, sci-fi is just plain wrong about human nature.
“It’s in your nature to destroy yourselves”
This line form Terminator 2 sums up how felt growing up during the end of the Cold War, palpably afraid of nuclear holocaust. But think about what a ridiculous sentiment this is for a moment. There’s an obvious retort from evolutionary biology that any species that seeks to destroy itself is, well, incredibly unfit. Self-destructive creatures clearly aren’t going to produce a lot of offspring and evolve to take over the planet. But there’s a different, more subtle response that focuses more on human nature, but we have to draw on Darwin again.
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Here’s another possible sensor based on tiny atomic clocks. This actually came to me in a dream, which I suppose is what I get for blogging after my bedtime.
Given that atomic clocks can sense very slight changes in gravity, they could be used in a sensor to detect flaws or cracks in structures. In my dream, it was a handheld gizmo that was used to check that all of the rivets were in place in a newly constructed bridge. More practically, however, it could be used to inspect bridges, airplanes, and other structures. I don’t know for certain, but I think that these types of inspections are all currently done visually, so even if it were a suitcase-sized device, the ability to see inside the structures should be a boon to safety.
Engineers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology are developing ultraprecise, portable atomic clocks. The obvious application of these clocks is to build highly accurate global positioning systems. Thta’s defnintely one goal, but these clocks are so sensitive that they have to adjust for variations in the Earth’s gravity, relativistic effects of the environment, basically any sort of gravitional or electromagnetic interference. That may sound like a tremendous technical hurdle, but it also opens up some very interesting possibilities.
For example, their degree of sensitivity means that the clocks can also be used to map the underground presence of oil or water or to map the ocean floor from a surface ship. Even more impressive, scientists have used an tiny atomic clock to monitor blow flow in a rat’s heart based on electromagnetic variations caused by the iron in the rat’s blood being pumped through the heart. But that pales in comparision to what’s possible:
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Fuel cells are attractive power sources because they contain no moving parts yet provide a continuous and long-lasting flow of electricity. In addition, they can scale easily from powering a laptop to powering an entire hospital. Hydrogen fuel cells are particularly attractive because hydrogen is plentiful and the reaction only produces electricity, water, and heat. However, there are several hurdles to overcome before we all start driving hydrogen-powered cars.
One such obstacle is the production of hydrogen because, while the element is common, it is generallyfound as part of a larger compound and not in a usable form. Pure hydrogen can be produced by electrolyzing water, but this process is inefficient. Hydrogen can also be produced in a process called steam reforming, but that also produces carbon dioxide, which negates the “green” energy of hydrogen. But now, researchers have developed a method for extracting hydrogen from organic compounds using bacteria. The new method method uses existing techniques and technology, so it could be implemented easily. What’s more, the method makes hydrogen production more energy efficient than corn-based ethanol.
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