From the monthly archives:

January 2009

Productive Nanosystems: The Movies

January 30, 2009

In his comment on Molecular Machine Assembly: The Movie, Drew Whitehouse reminded me of a set of excellent animations of biological productive nanosystems, work done by Drew Berry. These videos are based on scientific data describing molecular structure and function, and from what I’ve seen, Drew Berry’s work is the best of its kind. Below [...]

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Self-Assembly for Nanotechnology

January 26, 2009

Everyone knows how to assemble things: Just grasp the parts and put them together. Self-assembly, though, doesn’t work at all like this, and as a consequence, it presents major challenges. Despite its inherent difficulties and limitations, self-assembly is the leading means for implementing atomically precise nanotechnologies today, and I expect it will lead for years to come. Self-assembly is a powerful method, and powerful enough to provide a path to nanotechnologies that are yet more powerful. Improving methods for making complex structures by self-assembly is an enormously important area of research.

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Eric and Rosa’s 2008 in Summary

January 23, 2009

With a production-credit to the folks who provide the TagCrowd server.

 

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GOCE on a Mission of Gravity

January 20, 2009

I’m glad to see that someone finally found an excuse to launch a streamlined spacecraft that will cruise above Earth, steadily firing its engines to keep it moving. (Aristotelian physicists take note.) The European Space Agency will soon launch this sleek piece of hardware on a mission of gravity measurement with unprecedented accuracy: The Gravity [...]

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E-drexler.com upgraded

January 20, 2009

This blog is based on Chris Pearson’s theme for WordPress, Thesis, and as I got more accustomed to its nice, clean look, I became increasingly queasy about the look of my non-blog website, E-drexler.com.
I haven’t pulled the switch on a general transformation of the site yet, but the E-drexler.com home page shows the new look, [...]

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Toward Advanced Nanotechnology:

Nanomaterials (2)

January 16, 2009

As every mechanical engineer knows, the stiffness of a material — its elastic modulus — is often a critical property; likewise in nanomechanical engineering, though in part for a different reason. I’d like to say a few words about this, then discuss some materials of interest in implementing nanosystems. And there is something I must [...]

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Molecular Machine Assembly: The Movie

January 12, 2009

I just watched an extraordinary set of videos that shows the assembly and operation of an intricate molecular machine. Beware, though: these highly realistic videos lie — but because they must!

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Nudging Toward a Better Future

January 9, 2009

A new book, Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein describe surprising opportunities to improve the world today, and in doing so, they show how to make a future of accelerating change more livable for poorly informed human beings. The information and concepts have changed my way of thinking about some important issues.

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The Nobel Prize for Technology

January 8, 2009

We usually think of Nobel Prizes in physics, chemistry, and medicine as celebrations of scientific discovery, yet prizes are often awarded not for discovery, but for technological innovation. This is entirely proper, as you can perhaps see from the above excerpt of Alfred Nobel’s will.
I surveyed the awards since 2000 to see which were granted [...]

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Molecular Assembly Lines

January 5, 2009

Cells use what are, in effect, molecular assembly lines to manufacture a range of complex molecular products. Biochemists recently learned in greater detail how these biomolecular assembly lines work, and are considering how to string devices together to make artificial machines that work the same way.

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Greenhouse Gases and Advanced Nanotechnology

January 1, 2009

The greenhouse gas problem is far more intractable than most people think, and although there is a solution in sight, we will need a technological revolution to implement it…. molecular manufacturing capabilities will make it possible to reduce CO2 concentrations to pre-industrial levels within a short time span.

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