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Nanotechnology Fact and Fiction


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#1 Reno

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Posted 19 June 2009 - 09:23 AM


What do you think is and isn't possible with nanotechnology? I've read many different ideas about what could be done with nanotechnology, and I'm just interested in finding out what those of you think are plausable realities of it's application.

I'll get the ball started.

I think disease will be eradicated within the next twenty years using nanotechnology. I believe this will be done through using a combination of molecular machines as a secondary immune system, and genetic manipulation to replace any week or defective genes.

Edited by Mind, 04 July 2009 - 03:30 PM.
changed title


#2 forever freedom

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Posted 19 June 2009 - 03:11 PM

What do you think is and isn't possible with nanotechnology? I've read many different ideas about what could be done with nanotechnology, and I'm just interested in finding out what those of you think are plausable realities of it's application.

I'll get the ball started.

I think disease will be eradicated within the next twenty years using nanotechnology. I believe this will be done through using a combination of molecular machines as a secondary immune system, and genetic manipulation to replace any week or defective genes.



Twenty years, that's extremely unlikely IMO. I'd think about 45+ years.

I'll keep the ball rolling. I believe that almost anything is possible with developed enough nanotech. In 70+ years we will probably be able to upload ourselves to computers and there will be no need for SENS (by the way, SENS looks more like a symbol of the fight against aging than an actual fight. i hope DeGrey someday get his so precious funds, but i'm not counting on it and i'm not counting with the possibility of beating aging with a research project with the mere budget of 100-200 million a year). My chips for not dying lay with strong AI and nanotech and not with any form of current, direct anti-aging research -unless a project with the magnitude of several Manhattan Projects was established.

#3 Boondock

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Posted 20 June 2009 - 07:58 PM

^ I more or less agree with that analysis. The speed at which it becomes workable depends also on the amount of investment delivered. If nanotechnology were to have some strong military application, it'd come along a lot faster.

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#4 Reno

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Posted 21 June 2009 - 02:12 AM

Very basic machines are within our reach. I'm not saying the pinnacle of nanotech is within the next 20 years, but however I believe basic machines are. There was a news article just the other day describing the creation of controllable gears. There isn't bins of parts that go into making a basic machine. You have to realize that it doesn't take a fully formed nanite to fight a disease either. There are many drugs going through trials right now that are just basically engineered nanoparticles designed to carry drugs straight to a specific target. That is nanomedicine today. In just twenty years it'll be the difference between the building sized computers of the 60s and the mobile phones of the 80s.

Here is another idea. I believe particles will be created to bond to carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and then to one another. That way you can have a clean efficient means of removing the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. That would make it possible to filter carbon out of the atmosphere while at the same time create a source of pure carbon for manufacturing.

Edited by bobscrachy, 21 June 2009 - 02:21 AM.


#5 niner

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Posted 21 June 2009 - 02:21 AM

Here is another idea. I believe particles will be created to bond to carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and then to one other. That way you can have a clean efficient means of removing the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. That would make it possible to clean the environment up and at the same time create a source of pure carbon for manufacturing.

How are they going to drive the enormous free energy gap that such a process would entail?

#6 Reno

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Posted 21 June 2009 - 02:31 AM

Here is another idea. I believe particles will be created to bond to carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and then to one other. That way you can have a clean efficient means of removing the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. That would make it possible to clean the environment up and at the same time create a source of pure carbon for manufacturing.

How are they going to drive the enormous free energy gap that such a process would entail?


Hehe, you act like I have this planned out. If I knew how to do it I would be one wealthy son of a bitch. If carbon dioxide can float up into the atmosphere and bond with ozone or whatever it bonds to then it doesn't sound to far fetched that a particle can be released to bond to carbon and then to one another. I'm pretty sure water particles bond to one another and then rain falls.

Edited by bobscrachy, 21 June 2009 - 02:33 AM.


#7 niner

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Posted 21 June 2009 - 03:16 AM

Here is another idea. I believe particles will be created to bond to carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and then to one other. That way you can have a clean efficient means of removing the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. That would make it possible to clean the environment up and at the same time create a source of pure carbon for manufacturing.

How are they going to drive the enormous free energy gap that such a process would entail?

Hehe, you act like I have this planned out. If I knew how to do it I would be one wealthy son of a bitch. If carbon dioxide can float up into the atmosphere and bond with ozone or whatever it bonds to then it doesn't sound to far fetched that a particle can be released to bond to carbon and then to one another. I'm pretty sure water particles bond to one another and then rain falls.

Well, CO2 doesn't really bond with anything in the atmosphere. Water is a special case because it is so highly attracted to itself, but CO2 isn't like that. You are using the term "bond" to cover a wide range of molecular associations, from covalent attachments to relatively weak hydrogen bonds. If you wanted to get pure carbon for manufacturing, you would need to remove the oxygen from the CO2, which would require a lot of energy. Because the CO2 is so widely dispersed in the atmosphere, you'd be fighting an entropic battle as well. The ability to violate the fundamental laws of thermodynamics would be very profitable indeed.

#8 Reno

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Posted 21 June 2009 - 03:42 AM

Well, CO2 doesn't really bond with anything in the atmosphere. Water is a special case because it is so highly attracted to itself, but CO2 isn't like that. You are using the term "bond" to cover a wide range of molecular associations, from covalent attachments to relatively weak hydrogen bonds. If you wanted to get pure carbon for manufacturing, you would need to remove the oxygen from the CO2, which would require a lot of energy. Because the CO2 is so widely dispersed in the atmosphere, you'd be fighting an entropic battle as well. The ability to violate the fundamental laws of thermodynamics would be very profitable indeed.


So I'm glad to see my idea there went no where. Do you have an idea of what we might see in the next few years? I wanted to read some brave soul's interpretation of the future. Give me something specific besides, "anything is possible".

Edited by bobscrachy, 21 June 2009 - 03:44 AM.


#9 niner

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Posted 21 June 2009 - 03:58 AM

So I'm glad to see my idea there went no where. Do you have an idea of what we might see in the next few years? I wanted to read some brave soul's interpretation of the future. Give me something specific besides, "anything is possible".

Sorry to pee on the parade, but the thread title talks about fact and fiction...

What I'm hoping to see in the future is a very small specific molecule detector. If we could make a quantitative detector for the hundred or so most important molecular species in our bodies, and implant it under the skin, we could have an on-board diagnostic system that would communicate with an external device. This could tell us what we need to supplement at any given moment, or if some serious badness was imminent. If it was set up to detect pathogenic microbes, we could find out what we were infected with at any given moment, so we might dispatch them if needed. A likely nearer term version of this would be a larger box with such capability at your doctors office. The practice of medicine would change dramatically if accurate diagnoses were quick, easy, and cheap. Devices like these would use nanotechnology, but they wouldn't be nanomachines. I don't expect to see nanomachines anytime soon, if ever.

#10 Reno

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Posted 21 June 2009 - 05:37 AM

Sorry to pee on the parade, but the thread title talks about fact and fiction...



Far from it, you're posting. I was just looking to get a conversation going. That ball had stopped and I was giving it a nudge with something a little less fact then fiction. I do believe pollutants can be filtered out of the air, but I don't think we're near that point where global warming has become a serious problem. People are so afraid of global warming. Most people don't realize its happened before, and it'll happen again. All it'll take is one big volcano and the global temperature will fall 4 degrees.

Edited by bobscrachy, 21 June 2009 - 05:38 AM.


#11 Mind

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Posted 21 June 2009 - 03:35 PM

I'll keep the ball rolling. I believe that almost anything is possible with developed enough nanotech. In 70+ years we will probably be able to upload ourselves to computers and there will be no need for SENS (by the way, SENS looks more like a symbol of the fight against aging than an actual fight. i hope DeGrey someday get his so precious funds, but i'm not counting on it and i'm not counting with the possibility of beating aging with a research project with the mere budget of 100-200 million a year). My chips for not dying lay with strong AI and nanotech and not with any form of current, direct anti-aging research -unless a project with the magnitude of several Manhattan Projects was established.


I also think AI and nanotech research will have a much greater pay-off in the future. Might be 10 years down the road or even 20. The problem is that there are older people and sick people living right now who need interventions right now. Aubrey's bio-engineering approaches could bridge the gap for many of our parents and grandparents so they live to see the day when nanotech and AI give us much more powerful tools against aging and death. Lysosens is a good example. Natural enzymes have been found that can breakdown some AGEs. The laser approach might be very useful as well. If each of these (SENS) interventions can add a couple years to lifespans, they we would be saving a lot more lives in the long run.

#12 niner

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Posted 22 June 2009 - 04:54 AM

I do believe pollutants can be filtered out of the air, but I don't think we're near that point where global warming has become a serious problem. People are so afraid of global warming. Most people don't realize its happened before, and it'll happen again. All it'll take is one big volcano and the global temperature will fall 4 degrees.

Yes, it has happened before, but there weren't billions of people then. It also happened very slowly in the past, while it is happening very rapidly now, relative to earlier warmings. This gives us less time to adapt. Barring the unlikely event that runaway warming leaves us with a Venusian atmosphere, AGW probably isn't a threat to all of humanity, though it could be disruptive. If we could guarantee one big volcano every three and a half years, we would be all set. Then the coal industry could party on for another thousand years, providing a windfall for pulmonologists and undertakers alike.

#13 Reno

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Posted 22 June 2009 - 07:29 AM

Yes, it has happened before, but there weren't billions of people then. It also happened very slowly in the past, while it is happening very rapidly now, relative to earlier warmings. This gives us less time to adapt. Barring the unlikely event that runaway warming leaves us with a Venusian atmosphere, AGW probably isn't a threat to all of humanity, though it could be disruptive. If we could guarantee one big volcano every three and a half years, we would be all set. Then the coal industry could party on for another thousand years, providing a windfall for pulmonologists and undertakers alike.


Yup, because of our fossil fuel burning cars here in the states everyone is dying of lung cancer. On top of that every winter I turn on the weather channel to find yet another record breaking heat wave.. Last year in Wisconsin it was almost like being in a tropical paradise. We didn't even have to salt the roads. According to the experts, in the next forty years Florida will be under water along with 60% of the rest of the world. Since I'm going to believe all these doom and gloom articles about global warming I guess I need to start investing in boat companies. After all, everyone needs a place to live.

Edited by bobscrachy, 22 June 2009 - 07:32 AM.


#14 Cameron

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Posted 25 June 2009 - 02:48 PM

I think basically anything that is physically possible to build can be built with advanced nanotechnology. I also believed that self-replication, self-repair, local manufacturing and recycling, as well as energy production can be done in an automated manner.

But I don't believe it is possible for groups of humans to design and orchestrate large complex systems based on this technology in reasonable time-frames. I believe it will require advanced artificial intelligence to actually design and manipulate matter at the molecular scale in an energy efficient large and perpetuating manner.

Well, CO2 doesn't really bond with anything in the atmosphere. Water is a special case because it is so highly attracted to itself, but CO2 isn't like that. You are using the term "bond" to cover a wide range of molecular associations, from covalent attachments to relatively weak hydrogen bonds. If you wanted to get pure carbon for manufacturing, you would need to remove the oxygen from the CO2, which would require a lot of energy. Because the CO2 is so widely dispersed in the atmosphere, you'd be fighting an entropic battle as well. The ability to violate the fundamental laws of thermodynamics would be very profitable indeed.


So I'm glad to see my idea there went no where. Do you have an idea of what we might see in the next few years? I wanted to read some brave soul's interpretation of the future. Give me something specific besides, "anything is possible".


As for near-term, the most advanced things I believe will be the advances that will come in the areas of artificial life and synthetic biology. An artificial cell-like thing is likely to be created, and cells are likely to be altered to produce or degrade certain industrial compounds efficiently.

#15 kismet

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Posted 26 June 2009 - 10:52 PM

Twenty years, that's extremely unlikely IMO. I'd think about 45+ years.

...My chips for not dying lay with strong AI and nanotech and not with any form of current, direct anti-aging research -unless a project with the magnitude of several Manhattan Projects was established.

You expect it to take more than 45+ years but do not put much hope into current life extension technology á la SENS? Do you happen to believe in an after life or how do you imagine to benefit from the nanotech and AI developments when you are dead? First things first, please.

#16 Dmitri

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Posted 27 June 2009 - 06:09 AM

So I'm glad to see my idea there went no where. Do you have an idea of what we might see in the next few years? I wanted to read some brave soul's interpretation of the future. Give me something specific besides, "anything is possible".

Sorry to pee on the parade, but the thread title talks about fact and fiction...

What I'm hoping to see in the future is a very small specific molecule detector. If we could make a quantitative detector for the hundred or so most important molecular species in our bodies, and implant it under the skin, we could have an on-board diagnostic system that would communicate with an external device. This could tell us what we need to supplement at any given moment, or if some serious badness was imminent. If it was set up to detect pathogenic microbes, we could find out what we were infected with at any given moment, so we might dispatch them if needed. A likely nearer term version of this would be a larger box with such capability at your doctors office. The practice of medicine would change dramatically if accurate diagnoses were quick, easy, and cheap. Devices like these would use nanotechnology, but they wouldn't be nanomachines. I don't expect to see nanomachines anytime soon, if ever.


I sure hope there aren't that many fundamentalist left when that happens considering they would see those chips as the mark of the beast and oppose the idea or attempt to restrict funding for such a device.

#17 niner

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Posted 27 June 2009 - 06:47 AM

Yes, it has happened before, but there weren't billions of people then. It also happened very slowly in the past, while it is happening very rapidly now, relative to earlier warmings. This gives us less time to adapt. Barring the unlikely event that runaway warming leaves us with a Venusian atmosphere, AGW probably isn't a threat to all of humanity, though it could be disruptive. If we could guarantee one big volcano every three and a half years, we would be all set. Then the coal industry could party on for another thousand years, providing a windfall for pulmonologists and undertakers alike.

Yup, because of our fossil fuel burning cars here in the states everyone is dying of lung cancer. On top of that every winter I turn on the weather channel to find yet another record breaking heat wave.. Last year in Wisconsin it was almost like being in a tropical paradise. We didn't even have to salt the roads. According to the experts, in the next forty years Florida will be under water along with 60% of the rest of the world. Since I'm going to believe all these doom and gloom articles about global warming I guess I need to start investing in boat companies. After all, everyone needs a place to live.

I take it you haven't looked at the impact of particulates from coal burning on human health. It's poor. Coal is also the biggest source of mercury for most of us. You are being totally hyperbolic about Florida. No "expert" has said that it would be underwater in 40 years along with "60%" of the rest of the world. No one is asking you to believe in stuff that isn't going to happen. Unless, perhaps, your information is coming from the denialist community or fossil fuel industry. BTW, modern gasoline powered cars are exceptionally clean and are not responsible for a significant amount of disease. They are responsible for a large balance of payments deficit that is harming our economy, due to excessive oil imports.

#18 Reno

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Posted 27 June 2009 - 09:40 AM

I take it you haven't looked at the impact of particulates from coal burning on human health. It's poor. Coal is also the biggest source of mercury for most of us. You are being totally hyperbolic about Florida. No "expert" has said that it would be underwater in 40 years along with "60%" of the rest of the world. No one is asking you to believe in stuff that isn't going to happen. Unless, perhaps, your information is coming from the denialist community or fossil fuel industry. BTW, modern gasoline powered cars are exceptionally clean and are not responsible for a significant amount of disease. They are responsible for a large balance of payments deficit that is harming our economy, due to excessive oil imports.


Yes yes, you nailed it, I was being facetious.

Top of google. Global warming fast facts Straight from the mouth of those evil oil companies.

On a serious note, the earth is a big steel ball bearing. If an asteroid were to hit and blast us all to hell the Earth would be good as new in a few million years. The Earth has survived disaster after disaster, and it will eventually survive us. As far as global warming goes, thousands of people die every day of starvation. At this point a .8 degree rise in the temp is the least of our worries. Global temperatures are effected by so many variables: carbon dioxide, volcanic activity, asteroids, solar flares, etc. that we have more of an incentive to go green for economic reasons then we do environmental ones. To think that any policy that we could take would genuinely effect global warming is at best naive. You may label me one of "those people," but I'm just not worried. That is to say, I'm not worried about global warming.

Edited by bobscrachy, 27 June 2009 - 09:46 AM.


#19 niner

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Posted 28 June 2009 - 05:33 AM

I take it you haven't looked at the impact of particulates from coal burning on human health. It's poor. Coal is also the biggest source of mercury for most of us. You are being totally hyperbolic about Florida. No "expert" has said that it would be underwater in 40 years along with "60%" of the rest of the world. No one is asking you to believe in stuff that isn't going to happen. Unless, perhaps, your information is coming from the denialist community or fossil fuel industry. BTW, modern gasoline powered cars are exceptionally clean and are not responsible for a significant amount of disease. They are responsible for a large balance of payments deficit that is harming our economy, due to excessive oil imports.

Yes yes, you nailed it, I was being facetious.

Top of google. Global warming fast facts Straight from the mouth of those evil oil companies.

On a serious note, the earth is a big steel ball bearing. If an asteroid were to hit and blast us all to hell the Earth would be good as new in a few million years. The Earth has survived disaster after disaster, and it will eventually survive us. As far as global warming goes, thousands of people die every day of starvation. At this point a .8 degree rise in the temp is the least of our worries. Global temperatures are effected by so many variables: carbon dioxide, volcanic activity, asteroids, solar flares, etc. that we have more of an incentive to go green for economic reasons then we do environmental ones. To think that any policy that we could take would genuinely effect global warming is at best naive. You may label me one of "those people," but I'm just not worried. That is to say, I'm not worried about global warming.

OK, you don't take it seriously, and you are not a climate scientist. I won't label you a denialist, because I don't think you are one of "those people", but I don't think that dismissing climate change on the basis of the earth being a tough rock is a very good argument. Yeah, sure, the earth will survive; that isn't the figure of merit that we're interested in. The bigger question is what will happen to the inhabitants of earth in the near term, like say the next few centuries.

BTW, why did you link to "Global Warming Fast Facts" from the National Geographic, and say it was from the "evil oil companies"? Was that supposed to be where you got the assertion that Florida would be underwater in 40 years? It didn't say that... Of all places, in a thread titled "What is fact and what is fiction", could we agree to deal in facts or else label fiction as such?

#20 Reno

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Posted 28 June 2009 - 07:48 AM

OK, you don't take it seriously, and you are not a climate scientist. I won't label you a denialist, because I don't think you are one of "those people", but I don't think that dismissing climate change on the basis of the earth being a tough rock is a very good argument. Yeah, sure, the earth will survive; that isn't the figure of merit that we're interested in. The bigger question is what will happen to the inhabitants of earth in the near term, like say the next few centuries.


People will adapt like they always do.

BTW, why did you link to "Global Warming Fast Facts" from the National Geographic, and say it was from the "evil oil companies"?



A follow-up report by the IPCC released in April 2007 warned that global warming could lead to large-scale food and water shortages and have catastrophic effects on wildlife.

• Sea level could rise between 7 and 23 inches (18 to 59 centimeters) by century's end, the IPCC's February 2007 report projects. Rises of just 4 inches (10 centimeters) could flood many South Seas islands and swamp large parts of Southeast Asia.

• Some hundred million people live within 3 feet (1 meter) of mean sea level, and much of the world's population is concentrated in vulnerable coastal cities. In the U.S., Louisiana and Florida are especially at risk.


your information is coming from the denialist community or fossil fuel industry.


Was that supposed to be where you got the assertion that Florida would be underwater in 40 years? It didn't say that... Of all places, in a thread titled "What is fact and what is fiction", could we agree to deal in facts or else label fiction as such?

----> Geographic quote up above.

Ok, I might have exaggerated a bit by saying 60%, but then again I was being facetious.

Is 'navigator' a moderator or an administrator? In the beginning I created a thread to discuss fictitious or realistic ideas that would come out of nanotechnology. I was not intending to get sucked into the global warming debate. Hell, as I stated above I only put that idea out there to help move the thread along. Come up with a new idea that you think is more realistic and we'll have a gay Ol' time discussing it instead.

Edited by bobscrachy, 28 June 2009 - 08:04 AM.


#21 niner

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Posted 04 July 2009 - 06:42 AM

Was that supposed to be where you got the assertion that Florida would be underwater in 40 years? It didn't say that... Of all places, in a thread titled "What is fact and what is fiction", could we agree to deal in facts or else label fiction as such?

----> Geographic quote up above.

Ok, I might have exaggerated a bit by saying 60%, but then again I was being facetious.

Is 'navigator' a moderator or an administrator? In the beginning I created a thread to discuss fictitious or realistic ideas that would come out of nanotechnology. I was not intending to get sucked into the global warming debate. Hell, as I stated above I only put that idea out there to help move the thread along. Come up with a new idea that you think is more realistic and we'll have a gay Ol' time discussing it instead.

I'll say you exaggerated. You can't just spew things that aren't true and expect people to understand that you're kidding. A navigator is the name that we use for a moderator. There are a lot of moderators here. Nothing that I've said in this thread was done in my role as a moderator though; I'm speaking strictly as a regular member here. I did put up an idea (post #9) that I thought was realistic, but it was largely ignored. You kept posting anti-AGW things that were not fact-based; I just responded to them to correct the record.

#22 Reno

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Posted 04 July 2009 - 07:14 AM

I'll say you exaggerated. You can't just spew things that aren't true and expect people to understand that you're kidding. A navigator is the name that we use for a moderator. There are a lot of moderators here. Nothing that I've said in this thread was done in my role as a moderator though; I'm speaking strictly as a regular member here. I did put up an idea (post #9) that I thought was realistic, but it was largely ignored. You kept posting anti-AGW things that were not fact-based; I just responded to them to correct the record.


I can tell you are speaking as a regular member. A moderator would have moved back on topic by now. Exaggeration doesn't need to be explained when the facts are posted in the form of a national geographic facts chart. I'll start over though by saying yes I exaggerated statistics in a failed attempt at sarcasm.

What I'm hoping to see in the future is a very small specific molecule detector. If we could make a quantitative detector for the hundred or so most important molecular species in our bodies, and implant it under the skin, we could have an on-board diagnostic system that would communicate with an external device. This could tell us what we need to supplement at any given moment, or if some serious badness was imminent. If it was set up to detect pathogenic microbes, we could find out what we were infected with at any given moment, so we might dispatch them if needed. A likely nearer term version of this would be a larger box with such capability at your doctors office. The practice of medicine would change dramatically if accurate diagnoses were quick, easy, and cheap. Devices like these would use nanotechnology, but they wouldn't be nanomachines. I don't expect to see nanomachines anytime soon, if ever.


Would this be like an artificial lymph node?

Edited by bobscrachy, 04 July 2009 - 07:26 AM.


#23 niner

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Posted 05 July 2009 - 05:29 AM

I can tell you are speaking as a regular member. A moderator would have moved back on topic by now. Exaggeration doesn't need to be explained when the facts are posted in the form of a national geographic facts chart. I'll start over though by saying yes I exaggerated statistics in a failed attempt at sarcasm.

You are the one who's driving this diversion into AGW territory. I'm just responding to your posts because they contain factual errors presented as truth. I don't agree that exaggeration is ok just because the truth is posted in a very oblique way several days later.

Would this be like an artificial lymph node?

No, it would be more of an onboard diagnostic system. It would tell you what was going on, but you would still have to interpret the data and treat any problems with drugs or supplements. It would also allow you to monitor the results of treatment in real time, and adjust if needed.

#24 Reno

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Posted 05 July 2009 - 10:48 PM

Have you ever visited this page niner?

No, it would be more of an onboard diagnostic system. It would tell you what was going on, but you would still have to interpret the data and treat any problems with drugs or supplements. It would also allow you to monitor the results of treatment in real time, and adjust if needed.


Lymph nodes filter your blood for infections. If an infection is found it contains leukocytes to take care of it. If a lymph node becomes infected the body then becomes aware that it needs to fight a serious infection.

I doubt any artificial node that can diagnose general problems with the immune system, or drug supplements would be much different. They would need to be small so as to not impede the function of the body. They would also need to be in various places around the body to keep a thorough tab on all problems that could occur. Not all problems that happen in the intestines would show up as a chemical problem in the rest of the body.

Edited by bobscrachy, 05 July 2009 - 10:49 PM.


#25 niner

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Posted 06 July 2009 - 01:54 AM

No, it would be more of an onboard diagnostic system. It would tell you what was going on, but you would still have to interpret the data and treat any problems with drugs or supplements. It would also allow you to monitor the results of treatment in real time, and adjust if needed.

Lymph nodes filter your blood for infections. If an infection is found it contains leukocytes to take care of it. If a lymph node becomes infected the body then becomes aware that it needs to fight a serious infection.

I doubt any artificial node that can diagnose general problems with the immune system, or drug supplements would be much different. They would need to be small so as to not impede the function of the body. They would also need to be in various places around the body to keep a thorough tab on all problems that could occur. Not all problems that happen in the intestines would show up as a chemical problem in the rest of the body.

An artificial lymph node would be harder to do than what I'm proposing. A lymph node would have to identify and intercept microbes, while ignoring self. The immune system identifies microbes via surface antigens, but it's so good at that that I'd be inclined to take a different route, like looking for nucleotide sequences, in order to have better luck dealing with microbes that normally evade immune surveillance. Even if you were to recognize that an undesirable microbe was aboard on the basis of a nucleotide sequence, that still wouldn't tag the individual microbe. Here again, I think it would be better to use this system just to get a diagnosis, then treat it systemically with chemicals. Diagnosis is presently hard, while treatment, in most cases, is pretty easy. Diagnostic devices would be relatively easy to miniaturize to the point where they could be be placed inside the body, but treatment devices are, IMHO, an order of magnitude harder to do. Maybe two orders of magnitude...




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