Benford, Gregory - Biotech and Nanodreams

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GREGORY BENFORD

BIOTECH AND NANODREAMS

If this century has been dominated by bigness--big bombs, big rockets, big

wars, giant leaps for mankind -- then perhaps the next century will be the

territory of the tiny.

Biotech is already well afoot in our world, the stuff of both science fiction

and stock options. Biology operates on scales of ten to a hundred times a

nanometer (a billionth of a meter). Below that, from a few to ten nanometers,

lie atoms.

Nanotechnology -- a capability now only envisioned, applauded and longed for -

- attacks the basic structure of matter at the nanometer scale, tinkering with

atoms on a one-by-one basis. It vastly elaborates the themes chemistry and

biology have wrought on brute mass. More intricate, it can promise much. How

much it can deliver depends upon the details.

It is easy to see that if one is able to replace individual atoms at will, one

can make perfectly pure rods and gears like diamond, five times as stiff as

steel, fifty times stronger. Gears, bearings, drive shafts -- all the roles of

the factory can play out on the stage that for now only enzymes enjoy, inside

our cells.

For now, microgears and micromotors exist about a thousand times larger than

true nanotech. In principle, though, single atoms can serve as gear teeth,

with single bonds between atoms providing the bearing for rotating rods. It's

only a matter of time and will.

Much excitement surrounds the possibility of descending to such scales,

following ideas pioneered by Richard Feynman, in his 1961 essay, "There's

Plenty of Room at the Bottom." Later this view was elaborated and advocated by

Eric Drexler in the 1980s. Now some tentative steps toward the nanometer level

are beginning.

Such control is tempting. Like most bright promises, it is easy to see

possibilities, less simple to see what is probable.

Nanotech borders on biology, a vast field rich in emotional issues and popular

misconceptions. Many people, well versed in 1950s B-movies, believe that

radiation can mutate you into another life form directly, not merely your

descendants -- most probably, indeed, into some giant, ugly, hungry insect.

Not all fiction about nanotech or biotech is like this -- there are good

examples of firm thinking in Greg Bear's Queen of Angels and the anthology

Nanodreams edited by Elton Eliott, and elsewhere.

All too often, though, in the hands of some science fiction writers,

nanotech's promised abilities -- building atom by atom for strength and

purity, dramatic new shapes and kinds of substances -- lead to excess. We see

stories about quantum, biomolecular brains for space robots, all set to

conquer the stars. About miraculous, overnight reshaping of our entire

physical world -- the final victory of Information over Mass. Or about

accelerated education of our young by nanorobots which coast through their

brains, bringing encyclopedias of knowledge disguised in a single mouthful of

Koolaid.

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Benford, Gregory - Biotech and Nanodreams

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