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Human Challenges of NanoTechnology

By: Alexander M Zoltai, Fri Dec 9th, 2005 12:18:28 PM

Word Count: 1495 words Category: Science, Technology

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Human Challenges of NanoTechnology

This article is about NanoTech--building things from the "bottom-up"--working in the range of billionths of a meter. Just for a sense of scale, that's 1/75,000th the width of a human hair!

There are already nanotech products but they're referred to as "incremental" nano--adding nano-particles to existing products. Most of the current products are in the sports, apparel, and cosmetic industries.

I'm going to cover the basics about the Foresight Institute's "Challenges". Foresight, founded in 1986, is "the first organization to educate society about the benefits and risks of nanotechnology." Its Challenges are six broad areas of life that nanotech will infuse with significant breakthroughs.

The first Challenge is "Meeting global energy needs with clean solutions."

Most everyone knows there are severe problems in the areas of energy production, use, and management. Not many folks know that almost one third of the earth's population don't have electricity or that even more "rely on plant material, vegetation, or agricultural waste as an energy and heating source."

How can NanoTech help?

* More Efficient Lighting Obviously, if our lighting, for those who have it, is more efficient, we won't use as much energy.

* Better Fuel Cells Fuel Cells include common batteries (which are being improved almost daily) as well as some new and radical approaches to supplying energy.

* Better Hydrogen Storage We can't reasonably hope to convert our fossil fuel machines to hydrogen power until we solve some basic storage challenges.

* More Efficient & Novel Forms of Solar Cells How about a shirt that's impregnated with nano-solar cells that easily powers your cell phone or palm-top computer?

And further down the nano-road would be: * Decentralized Generation and Storage by Reinventing the Power Grid.

Since nanotech is swiftly becoming capable of producing necessary and helpful applications, most of what we consider normal today will be reinvented!

Foresight Institute's second nano-Challenge is "Providing Abundant Clean Water Globally."

About 1% of the earth's water is readily available for human consumption and, according to Foresight, "...1.1 billion people don't have access to safe water and 2.4 billion lack sanitation facilities. 80% of developing world diseases are water-borne..."

Add to those figures the fact that, by 2030, the demand on the water supply will rise 60%.

What can nano do?

* Inexpensive Decentralized Water Purification Cheap and pure and made that way as locally as necessary.

* Detection on the Molecular Level of Contaminants Detection today is generally handled through chemical analysis but here we're talking about fine-grained, continual inspection, not just periodic batch tests.

* Greatly Improved Filtration Systems Not just straining out bulk impurities but actually "grabbing" noxious molecules and eliminating them. We do have such systems but nanotech can create a quantum increase in effectiveness.

If you'd like a clear and expert opinion on how nano can help with our water crisis, Foresight includes the comments of Stephen L. Gillett, Ph.D., Dept. of Geological Sciences, University of Nevada: http://www.foresight.org/challenges/water001.html

HEALTH & LONG LIFE

If you could, would you opt for living 100 years? If it were proven safe, would you get injected with nano-devices that would slow most aging processes? If you could be given a guarantee of good health, no matter what you did to your body, would you take it?

If people live a lot longer, what will we do about over-population? Won't it be the case that only rich people will be able to afford longevity treatments? Isn't it true that disease and death are a part of life we'll never conquer?

Just some of the questions that come up when Foresight's third nano-Challenge is discussed.

Keeping bodies far healthier than we've so far been able to and extending the normal human life-span won't take magic. All it will take is the right kind of extremely tiny "doctors"--devices that are so small a few thousand could fit in one human cell. Nano-helpers so smart they can identify disease-causing molecules and eliminate them with no side-effects.

They same type of miniscule, intelligent "nano-docs" (let's call them nano-surgeons) will be able to heal damaged tissue, completely remake failed organs, and actually bring about changes in our bodies that we individually choose. Want a larger head? How about getting rid of those wide hips mom gave you? Longer legs? Different colored hair? These ideas are a bit beyond mere health and long life but the very same techniques that make disease and early death a thing of the past will also make what may seem bizarre options commonplace.

This will become possible...

For a more sober (yet still fantastic) prognosis of what's possible in this area, check out Foresight's take on Increasing Health and Longevity of Human Life: http://www.foresight.org/challenges/health.html

Give Me Food !

Here's the bad news:

"The world population is currently at 6.4 billion and is estimated to swell to 8.9 billion by the year 2050. It is anticipated that 98% of this growth will be in poorer countries. It is also predicted that there will be 5 billion city dwellers by 2030 which will place heavy demands on the growth and distribution of food."

That's from the Foresight Institute's page on Maximizing Productivity of Agriculture, their fourth "Nanotechnology Challenge".

So what's the good Nano-News?

First, I think it's important, because of the recent uproar over genetically-altered food, to give some information about "Bt corn". This was a particular plant that was genetically-altered and got some bad press. The paper Perception of Risks and Nanotechnology, says, "Intriguingly, the initial negative perceptions of the unknown risks were not subsequently overcome by the agreed upon evidence that Bt corn is harmless."

This is a short-term irritant to the overwhelming power of nanotechnology: people of short-sight and entrenched opinions are fighting it.

Foresight Institute offers some expert opinion on this issue in Anthony Fletcher's article,The Food Industry and Nanotechnology. In this article, he says, "The food industry, which is under intense pressure to guarantee safety and at the same time achieve better profit margins, is just beginning to see the possibilities that nanotechnology offers right along the supply chain, from the field right through to the factory and onto the supermarket shelf."

Give Me Access or Give Me Death !

As you can tell, I'm just laying down a broad overview of the major areas of concern in the field of nanotechnology and Foresight has been around long and strong enough to provide a clear outline of what's most important.

The next area of critical concern is the "Internet"--choose your definition because it keeps changing, even as we speak. Back in 1986, Eric Drexler laid the foundation of what most of us take for granted today. Check out this seminal document and discover The Network of Knowledge. Written almost 20 yeas ago, this is a solid call forward toward what we, almost, take for granted today. But there is always more: http://www.foresight.org/EOC/EOC_Chapter_14.html

As the Foresight Institute sees it, "The use of nanotechnology applications will drastically reduce the cost and increase the performance of memory, displays, processors, solar powered components, and embedded intelligence systems. It will also enable networks to be self-configuring. These improvements would create a pervasive computing environment that would promote greater global communication, cross-cultural understanding and cooperation."

No way around it. Whether we capitalize on the nano-breakthrough or not, we have the Internet-Breakthrough to deal with...

Space Enough...

So, we've been through five Major Concerns about the potential of Nanotechnology. Here is the, possibly, most Important: Space...

Why is Space so important?

How about these concerns: Survival, Growth, Prosperity and Curiosity?

Survival because we as a species will, constantly, seek new territory. Growth because the earth, no matter how spacious, is becoming too small... Prosperity because Space holds more "Stuff" than most of us can comprehend. Curiosity because the potential benefits of Space definitely exist !

The Challenge from Foresight's "Enabling the Development of Space":

* Humanity is vulnerable to natural global catastrophes, although it is only recently that we have become aware of some of these threats. * We are vulnerable to other global threats of our own making. * All habitable land on Earth is owned, so opportunities are reduced. * Because there are many people who don't own property, it is more difficult for an individual to work for him or herself; the worth of an individual's labor is reduced, thereby accentuating the differences between the haves and the have-nots. * Strong governments are prevalent, so it is very difficult to experiment with new political systems. The American experiment in regulated free enterprise and in representative democracy was made possible by a power vacuum that can most easily exist in a new frontier.

Notice the Theme there? Space is Territory--Real Estate... Also, Space is where humanity is headed...

I've recently become co-author of a new NanoBlog. All these issues are covered there (with more links and info) plus we stay up to date with who's doing what on the NanoFront: what new products are out there; who's found the latest breakthrough; what are the current dangers and how can we avoid them?

Come on over and tell us what you think: http://www.nanotechbuzz.com/ ~~~~~~~~~

Also, I'd love to hear from you with any comments or criticisms you may have about this article. Everything can be improved, right ?

Write to me at:

alexander@creative-weblogging.com

About the author: Alexander is an active writer in many fields. He's been on the Web (and steadily surfing) since it began. As he says, "I've never stopped learning."

Nanotechnology has been an avid interest for him since 1986.

His contributions in the blog he co-authors [ http://www.nanotechbuzz.com ] focus on applications of nanotech that are "coming on line", those that impact us in our daily lives.

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