X-Message-Number: 20966 From: Date: Sat, 25 Jan 2003 17:23:57 EST Subject: a small nano step for me... --part1_153.1adb93b0.2b64687d_boundary Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I think nano technology must look at far simpler objects that what is found in the literature on the subject. It is true that a number of parts have been produced, many come from the biochemical domain. Self assembly seems to work with great difficulties up to half a dozen parts or so. Making a useful device with some hundreds elements can't be done that way. Promized nano assemblers are no more substantial that religious faith, so something must be done in that domain. I suggest to use the old printed circuit technology. There are components on a side and a printed board with holes on the other side. Components are plugged into place on the board before soldering. For nanosystems, the board could be made from alumino-silicate sheet crystals some micrometers in diameter. A defect free crystal would be flat, such a crystal would be the starting point. Using an atomic force microscope, some atoms could be deposited on the surface, a laser pulse would then "cook" the area so that the atom would enter the crystal latice. If that atom is bigger or smaller that the normal one in the crystal it will distort the structure and bend the surface. A relief could be built that way. A canion could be the place for a carbon nanotube conductor, a protein fixed to a gold ball could be fixed by a ball socket and so on. If each component has a definite size/shape, it could be put in a liquid solution with all others and the board. Simple brownian displacement would then assemble the complete system. Making the printed board with an atomic force microscope need no technological progress, the tools are on the market today. The only requirement is a lot of patience. Flat alumino-silicate crystals are known in bulk form as clay. In a saturated solution, they catalyse the formation of identical crystals above their surface. Clay is maide of dish-like columns of such crystals. When impurities produce a corugated surface, this one is reproduced sheet after sheet. It may take some months to build the first clay printed circuit, but after that it will reproduce in the right medium as bacteria in a fermenter. I give that idea here because I think it is the most doable in the short term and as a way to block potential patents on it. Yvan Bozzonetti. --part1_153.1adb93b0.2b64687d_boundary Content-Type: text/html; charset="US-ASCII" [ AUTOMATICALLY SKIPPING HTML ENCODING! ] Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=20966