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Health & Wellness

2007-02-01 16:23:00

Molecular manufacturing...what is it?

What is Molecular Manufacturing?

ANSWER: This month’s column is a continuation in the discussion of the “Big Picture” for Nanotechnology, its future, and how developments in Nanotechnology will affect the lives of our children and grandchildren. Richard Feynman, noted American physicist and 1965 Nobel Prize winner for his work in understanding subatomic particles, was the free thinker credited with laying the intellectual groundwork for the development of today’s concepts in nanotechnology. Over 40 years ago, he stated, “The principles of physics, as far as I can see, do not speak against the possibility of maneuvering things atom by atom.” Molecular manufacturing, as we are discussing it today, is the theoretical process of manufacturing items by constructing their components, atom by atom. Several months ago, I stated that technology as we currently know it is a product of industry. Raw materials are taken from the earth or from nature, and they are changed into forms that someone considers useful. Trees become lumber, then houses. Mountains become rubble, then molten iron, then steel, then automobiles. Sand becomes purified gas, then silicon, then computer chips. And so it goes. I pointed out that nature shows us there is another way. For example, consider how trees make wood. Leaves gather solar energy using molecular electronic systems to create the reaction of photosynthesis. Energy from the leaves drives precise molecular machines that process carbon dioxide and water into oxygen and molecular building blocks. Trees grow, creating more wood, by using other molecular machines to join these molecular building blocks together, forming roots, trunks, branches, twigs, solar collectors (leaves), and more molecular machines. Each leaf is an incredibly sophisticated molecular manufacturing facility that works quietly and efficiently without human input, while consuming pollutants in the process. The fields of chemistry and mechanical engineering will gradually blend with the molecular sciences and use nanotechnology to create new molecular machines operating in accord with equations forming the basis of natural law. As manufacturing becomes increasingly based on the interaction of molecular machines, the high technology found in the functions of nature, with trees as a good example, may ultimately become the model for how our industrial processes operate. Most nanoscale research currently being funded involves developing very small nanostructures, identifying their novel properties and figuring ways to use these new properties in new products. This is very useful work, and in many cases, it could become quite profitable. However, this work is quite different from molecular nanotechnology which is leading to molecular manufacturing. The goal of molecular manufacturing is to construct complex products from individual atoms by placing each one in its proper place according to an exact blueprint. The atoms are joined together into minute structures that are replicated over and over again. Vast numbers of identical structures are produced that become the building blocks for manufacturing larger components, structures and machines. It is somewhat like joining individual bricks together according to blueprints and creating houses, except it is happening at a microscopic scale. What we are discussing today is theory, but experts believe it will be a reality within a few years. This theory begins with a very small nano-robotic device called a “fabricator” that can be programmed to use supplied chemicals to create large molecules that can be joined to create specific structural patterns. An example of this is to build diamond lattice through mechanically guided chemistry. By building the lattice in various directions, a wide variety of components can be made. This diamond structure would be at least ten times as strong as steel for the same weight – probably closer to 100 times as strong. The robotic system used to build the diamond structure could also be used to assemble the parts into a machine. In fact, there is no reason why a robotic system cannot build a copy of itself. Since a single fabricator is very small, it is limited in what it can produce. However, since each atom is placed in an exact location according to the programmed assembly instructions, a fabricator can duplicate itself easily and quickly, producing as many exact copies of itself as are needed. Large numbers of fabricators can be combined to build a personal nanofactory capable of making a wide variety of small products. A personal nanofactory can also make copies of itself, enabling large numbers of personal nanofactories to be combined to create larger molecular manufacturing facilities that can be used to produce even larger products. Next month we will discuss how nanofactories will speed the process to developing a product, testing it and taking it to market while improving quality, reducing costs and preserving resources. We will also discuss when this can be expected to become reality.