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Private Enterprise- To mars

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HereForNow
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« Reply #105 on: September 04, 2007, 07:56:49 pm »


Biomimetic systems that are composed of rigid polymers orfilaments and crosslinking molecules can be used to assemble filamentnetworks and bundles. The bundles represent 'nanoropes' and exhibitmaterial properties that are primarily determined by the number ofplaited filaments. Scientists at the Max Planck Institute of Colloidsand Interfaces in Potsdam, Germany have now shown that this assembly offilaments into bundles is prevented by the thermal motion of thefilaments, unless the crosslinker concentration exceeds a certainthreshold value. The latter value depends on the number of filaments,but remains finite in the limit of a large filament number. As thecrosslinker concentration is lowered, the bundles may segregate intosmall sub-bundles, or undergo abrupt unbinding transitions.

Biological cells aremechanically stable because they contain actin filaments andmicrotubules that form networks and bundles. These filamentarchitectures are determined and controlled by crosslinking proteins,which have two sticky ends that bind to different filaments. In orderto understand the underlying forces and to optimise the mechanicalproperties of these architectures, one must study biomimetic modelsystems that are solely composed of filaments and crosslinkingproteins. One important example is the assembly of several filamentsinto thick bundles or 'nanoropes' that are more rigid, and sustain alarger external load, than single filaments.

The assembly offilaments by molecular crosslinkers is disturbed by the thermal motionof the filaments. Scientists at the Max Planck Institute of Colloidsand Interfaces have now shown that this thermal motion preventsfilament assembly unless the crosslinker concentration exceeds acertain threshold value. The latter value depends on the filamentrigidity, on the binding energy of the crosslinkers, and on thetemperature. Furthermore, the threshold value decreases as the number Nof filaments within the bundle is increased, but remains finite in thelimit of large N.

Snapshots of filament bundles as observed incomputer simulations are displayed in Fig. 1. The snapshot in Figure1(a) shows a loose bundle for a crosslinker concentration only slightlyabove the threshold value. The simulations also reveal that thesebundles do not always reach their equilibrium shape, but oftensegregate into sub-bundles containing typically five filaments as shownin Figure 1(b). This bundle morphology differs strongly from the fullyequilibrated bundle shape as shown in Figure 1(c) for the same system.Which of the two morphologies is attained depends on the initialarrangement of the filaments and on the kinetics of the assemblyprocess.

Biomimetic systems, consisting of solutions of actinfilaments and crosslinking proteins, have also been studiedexperimentally by several research groups. The available experimentaldata is consistent with the new theory based on the interplay ofmolecular crosslinkers and thermal motion. In particular, there is someexperimental evidence for the threshold concentration of crosslinkersand the sudden onset of filament bundle formation above thisconcentration, but systematic experimental studies remain to be donethat explore the dependence on the filament number N.

Apart fromrepresenting important structural elements, filament bundles can alsoprovide strong pushing forces. These pushing forces arise from thedirected growth of the filaments by the addition of molecular buildingblocks. One important problem is to understand the dependence of thesepushing forces on the number of filaments within the bundle.
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HereForNow
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« Reply #106 on: September 04, 2007, 08:07:29 pm »

Now the question that seems to haunt me is;
How do you take something the is 1,000 times smaller then a human hair, and turn it into 1/2 inch thick,
sheets @ 12x12 ft. square? (144 sq. ft.)
At a rate of about 12 a day?
For that matter, structural supports that are rounded, and at least 24 inch OD?
6- 4in. cables? Self assembled into supports, creating these supports that become one peice.
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HereForNow
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« Reply #107 on: September 04, 2007, 09:23:07 pm »

Research promising revolution in speed and security of information technology is awarded with £4.4m by the Government's main science funding agency, the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPRSC). According to the news release by University of Cambridge, Research aims to develop supercomputer based on nanostructures also expected to discover new laws of physics.

The new supercomputers will work on the principle alien to current engineering community. Team of scientists from Universities department of physics at cavendish laboratory wants to develop a new generation of tiny semiconductors. This semiconductors will be developed on a nanoscale; probably smallest electronic structures ever. These Nanostructures will be the main component computer chips enabling communication of information faster than ever before. These Supercomputers based on Nanostructures will be called 'Quantum Computers'.

Professor Sir Michael Pepper, who is Principal Investigator on the four-year project and head of the Semiconductor Physics Group at the Cavendish, said: "We are not talking about speeding up reactions by a factor of two or three, but by a factor of billions! Currently computing operations happen in sequence. With the new technology they will happen in parallel."

Other investigators in the team at the Cavendish Laboratory include Professor David Ritchie, Professor Charles Smith, Dr Crispin Barnes, Dr Chris Ford, Dr Geb Jones, and Dr Kalaricad Thomas, who are joined by Professor Michael Kelly in the Department of Engineering.

"The main applications for the new quantum computers will initially be enormous databases and security," said Professor Pepper. "Beyond that, quantum technology will impact on everyone's lives, but we are not yet sure how. This work will bring about a fusion of technology with the most fundamental theory of nature - the laws of quantum mechanics. We anticipate finding new types of behaviour in physics when dimensions become extremely small.

"It is hard to say just what the full implications of this work are, in a way that we did not understand the full impact of computers when scientists in Cambridge first worked on them in the 1940s. I hope that the research will contribute to new industries yet to be born."

Imagine a network of six of these computers that reach a level of A.I. as if it were, or living as we can it.  Grin
All though, I pray that they evolve beyond war and destruction.
Then again, the evil as it is often thought of is man's creation as well.
Man is also known as a destroyer. Will man's creation even today, ever be more then another barrel of oil to a gallon of blood?
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« Reply #108 on: September 05, 2007, 10:08:04 am »

 Smiley 
Quote
Man is also known as a destroyer. Will man's creation even today, ever be more then another barrel of oil to a gallon of blood?


To paraphrase Captain Kirk from a Star Trek episode:  “We are a killer race.  But we can choose not to kill today.”  Supposedly we are God’s latest creation.  And so we are like my signature quote: “As above so below”.  There “was” a war in heaven, and the good angels threw the evil angels out of heaven.  And so this same war between good and evil rages in each and every one of us.  When we choose not to kill today, the good forces in us are winning that war.  Will our creation ever be more then another barrel of oil to a gallon of blood… well that depends to which one of us you are addressing. Collectively I think the outcome of that war will be on earth just as it was in heaven…. “as above, so below”   Wink

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HereForNow
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« Reply #109 on: September 05, 2007, 04:08:36 pm »

And so this same war between good and evil rages in each and every one of us.  When we choose not to kill today, the good forces in us are winning that war.  Will our creation ever be more then another barrel of oil to a gallon of blood… well that depends to which one of us you are addressing. Collectively I think the outcome of that war will be on earth just as it was in heaven…. “as above, so below”

 Cool
But, thats what I thought was happening already....
Eventually we can adjust, to a much less complicated path.
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« Reply #110 on: September 05, 2007, 09:05:11 pm »

First "Molecules to Robots" Effort 
The Tufts team represents the first major effort to design a truly soft-bodied locomoting robot with the workspace capabilities similar to those of a living animal. While other groups around the world are applying biomimetic approaches to engineering design, most focus on narrow areas within this field. 
"This represents a wonderfully rich and novel collaboration that takes a comprehensive 'molecules to robots' approach to the use of soft materials," notes Linda M. Abriola, dean of the Tufts School of Engineering. 
Work will focus on four primary areas: Control systems for soft-bodied robots, biomimetic and bionic materials, robot design and construction, and development and application of research-based platform technologies. 
Caterpillars and Silkworms 
The Keck grant will provide the team with specialized equipment for use with soft materials and biomechanics experiments, according to Trimmer, whose work with caterpillars provides insights on how to build the world's first soft-bodied robot (http://ase.tufts.edu/biology/faculty/trimmer/locomotion.html). Trimmer, a neurobiologist, has been studying the nervous system and biology since 1990 through grants from the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation. His goal has been to better understand how the creatures can control their fluid movements using a simple brain and how they can move so flexibly without any joints. He hopes to adapt his caterpillar research to this new project using the expertise of Tufts engineers. 
Kaplan, whose laboratory focuses on biopolymer engineering (http://ase.tufts.edu/biomedical/faculty-staff/kaplan.asp) , has already uncovered the secret of how spiders and silkworms are able to spin webs and cocoons made of incredibly strong yet flexible fibers. More recently, his team applied genetic engineering and nanotechnology to create a "fusion protein" that for the first time combined the toughness of spider silk with the intricate structure of silica. Kaplan notes that there has been tremendous progress in the development and use of soft materials in devices ranging from keyboards to toys. "However, it is very hard to make soft devices that move around and can be precisely controlled," he says. "This is the fundamental reason why robots currently move like robots instead of lifelike animals." 
The new robots developed at Tufts will be continuously deformable and capable of collapsing and crumpling into small volumes. They will have capabilities that are not currently available in single machines including climbing textured surfaces and irregular objects, crawling along ropes and wires, or burrowing into complex confined spaces. "Soft-bodied robots could make many dangerous surgeries much safer and less painful," Trimmer adds. "They could also be used by NASA to repair space stations by reaching places that astronauts can't, perform more complicated tasks in industry that require flexibility of movement, help in hazardous environments like nuclear reactors and landmine detection, and squeeze more efficiently into tight spaces." 
In addition to Trimmer and Kaplan, Assistant Professors Robert White, mechanical engineering, and Sameer Sonkusale, electrical and computer engineering, will supervise projects in the Tufts Microfabrication Laboratory. Associate Professor Luis Dorfmann, civil and environmental engineering, and Visiting Assistant Professor Gary Leisk, mechanical engineering, will supervise the material testing and modeling parts of the project, and Assistant Professor Valencia Joyner, electrical and computer engineering and Sonkusale will direct the design and production of sensors and soft material integrated circuits. 
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HereForNow
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« Reply #111 on: September 05, 2007, 09:11:49 pm »

 Wink

The most startling breakthroughs in nanotechnology are owned by only a small handful of companies -- companies whose earnings are now poised for rapid expansion.  Your returns from nanotech stocks could easily exceed those of the telecom and e-commerce boom of the late 1990s -- without the meltdown that followed.

You could earn many times your investment over the next few years as nanotechnology penetrates every aspect of manufacturing and materials science.  Thousands of investors certainly will.

I have spent much of the past decade researching and writing about emerging technologies -- including nanotechnology.

I truly believe nanotechnology is the fastest way to increase your wealth over the next few years, Discover which companies are fast becoming the giants in the nanotech sector -- and to get in ahead of the crowd.

As interest in nanotechnology stocks soars in the coming months, there will be many new nanotech stocks offered to the public.

This is one of the other ways that the very same technology we've been discussing is just one more way this is a self-sustaining project that could certainly one day be a reality.

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mdsungate
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« Reply #112 on: September 06, 2007, 02:34:50 pm »

 Smiley  We've talked about robots and nanotechnology.  But what we need to help build this space station are nano robots.  If we only had little guys that could take raw space debris and reform it into what we need to build the space station, then maybe it could be done economically. 

Lets say we tow a metalic metorite pice of space debris, (as many metorites are made of iron), and then poured a few ounces of nano-robots on it.  Then the robots would reform the molecules of iorn into a preprogramed shape of metal for use in the space station. 

Then if this nanotechnology cost $10,000 an ounce, so what!  That kind of "substance" would be worth more than it's weight in gold!

Or is this too far out?   Cool
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HereForNow
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« Reply #113 on: September 06, 2007, 06:10:29 pm »

 Shocked Now, hauling in debris is a good idea. I won't knock the possibilities ever.
In fact, I like that idea alot and if it were to all happen I'm sure that would be one of the implemented plans. Thing is, we still have all this waste material here on earth.  Wink

The percentage of energy per megawatt output required to be bled off a plant's output to power the re-carbonization process turns out to be very low. One conceptualized process used only 0.4% of the output of a normalized power plant to power the entire process. This is clearly a cost that is absorbable or subsidizable. Granting tax credits for installation of CO2 re-carbonization machinery would most likely sail through Congress and be signed by a President from either party.  Roll Eyes

Now how do we turn CO2 into something safe and usable?
 Undecided

Smart materials and products: Here, materials and products capable of relatively complex behavior due to the incorporation of nanocomputers and nanomachines. Also used for products having some ability to respond to the environment.

To see how nanomachines could be used to clean up pollution, imagine a device made of smart materials and roughly resembling a tree, once it has been delivered and unfolded. Above ground are solar-collecting panels; below ground, a branching system of rootlike tubes reaches a certain distance into the soil. By extending into a toxic waste dump, these rootlike structures could soak up toxic chemicals, using energy from the solar collectors to convert them into harmless compounds. Rootlike structures extending down into the water table could do the same cleanup job in polluted aquifers.

Cleansing the Atmosphere
Most atmospheric pollutants are quickly washed out by rain (turning them into soil- and water-pollution problems), but some air pollutants are longer lasting. Among these are the chlorine compounds attacking the ozone layer that protects the Earth from excessive ultraviolet radiation. Since 1975, observers have recorded growing holes in the ozone layer: at the South Pole, the hole can reach as far as the tips of South America, Africa, and Australia. Loss of this protection subjects people to an increased risk of skin cancer and has unknown effects on ecosystems. The new technology base will be able to stop the increase in ozone-destroying compounds, but the effects would linger for years. How might this problem be reversed more rapidly?

Thus far, we've talked about nanotechnology in the laboratory, in manufacturing plants, and in products for direct human use. Molecular manufacturing can also make products that will perform some useful temporary function when tossed out into the environment. Getting rid of ozone-destroying pollutants high in the stratosphere is one example. There may be simpler approaches, without the sophistication of nanotechnology, but here is one that would work to cleanse the stratosphere of chlorine: Make huge numbers of balloons, each the size of a grain of pollen and light enough to float up into the ozone layer. In each, place a small solar-power plant, a molecular-processing plant, and a microscopic grain of sodium. The processing plant collects chlorine-containing compounds and separates out the chlorine. Combining this with the sodium makes sodium chloride-ordinary salt. When the sodium is gone, the balloon collapses and falls. Eventually, a grain of salt and a biodegradable speck fall to Earth, usually at sea. The stratosphere is soon clean.

A larger problem (with a ground-based solution) is climatic change caused by rising carbon dioxide (CO2) levels. Global warming, expected by most climatologists and probably under way today, is caused by changes in the composition of Earth's atmosphere. The sun shines on the Earth, warming it. The Earth radiates heat back into space, cooling. The rate at which it cools depends on how transparent the atmosphere is to the radiation of heat. The tendency of the atmosphere to hold heat, to block thermal radiation from escaping into space, causes what is called the "greenhouse effect." Several gases contribute to this, but CO2 presents the most massive problem. Fossil fuels and deforestation both contribute. Before the new technology base arrives, something like 300 billion tons of excess CO2 will likely have been added to the atmosphere.

Small greenhouses can help reverse the global greenhouse effect. By permitting more efficient agriculture, molecular manufacturing can free land for reforestation, helping to repair the devastation wrought by hungry people. Growing forests absorb CO2.

If reforestation is not fast enough, inexpensive solar energy can be applied to remove CO2 directly, producing oxygen and glossy graphite pebbles. Painting the world's roads with solar cells would yield about four trillion watts of power, enough to remove CO2 at a rate of 10 billion tons per year. Temporarily planting one-tenth of U.S. farm acreage with a solar cell "crop" would provide enough energy to remove 300 billion tons in five years; winds would distribute the benefits worldwide. The twentieth century insult to Earth's atmosphere can be reversed by less than a decade of twenty-first century repair work. Ecosystems damaged in the meantime are another matter.



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« Reply #114 on: September 06, 2007, 07:43:23 pm »

Iron?  You mean that stuff that rusts really fast Grin
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Logic rules.

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HereForNow
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« Reply #115 on: September 06, 2007, 07:44:45 pm »

Orbital Waste
The space near Earth is being polluted with small orbiting projectiles, some as small as a pin. Most of the debris is floating fragments of discarded rocket stages, but it also includes gloves and cameras dropped by astronauts. This is not a problem for life on Earth, but it is a problem as life begins its historic spread beyond Earth—the first great expansion since the greening of the continents, long ago.

Orbiting objects travel much faster than rifle bullets, and energy increases as the square of speed. Small fragments of debris in space can do tremendous damage to a spacecraft, and worse—their impact on an spacecraft can blast loose yet more debris. Each fragment is potentially deadly to a spacefaring human crossing its path. Today, the tiny fraction of space that is near Earth is increasingly cluttered.

This litter needs to be picked up. With molecular manufacturing, it will be possible to build small spacecraft able to maneuver from orbit to orbit in space, picking up one piece of debris after another. Small spacecraft are needed, since it makes no sense to send a shuttle after a scrap of metal the size of a postage stamp. With these devices, we can clean the skies and keep them hospitable to life.

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« Reply #116 on: September 06, 2007, 08:03:13 pm »

Iron?  You mean that stuff that rusts really fast Grin

I think we might be on the part of a start up for experimenting with ideas towards building a "working", business plan.
LOL As if....

Funding would probably come from the production of electricity, recycling CO2, and making fusion reactors that would break down refuse in land fills, and clean water from sewage.
 Grin

The private Enterprise part is already well under way.
Now, what will we want to accomplish in a 3 year mission while we're on Mars?
 
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« Reply #117 on: September 06, 2007, 09:15:21 pm »




Han and his colleagues are in the midst of ongoing research into the structure and properties of cerium oxide nanotubes. As part of this, they have devised a method to synthesize cerium oxide nanotubes of high quality. First, they allow the compounds cerium nitrate and ammonia hydroxide to chemically react. Initially, this reaction forms "one-dimensional" nanostructures, such as rods and sheets, made of the intermediate product cerium hydroxide. The intermediate product is then quickly cooled to zero degrees Celsius, which freezes those structures into place. By letting the chemical reaction proceed over a long period of time, a process called "aging," the hydrogen is eventually removed from the intermediate product and a large quantity of the desired end product -- cerium oxide nanotubes -- is formed.

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« Reply #118 on: September 06, 2007, 09:18:42 pm »

Carbon is a chemical element in the periodic table that has the symbol C and atomic number 6. Carbon occurs in all organic life and is the basis of organic chemistry. This nonmetal also has the interesting chemical property of being able to bond with itself and a wide variety of other elements, forming nearly 10 million known compounds.
 Smiley


The abundance of carbon in the universe, along with the unusual polymer-forming ability of carbon-based compounds at the common temperatures encountered on Earth, make this element the basis of the chemistry of all known life.

The name "carbon" comes from Latin language carbo, coal. In some Romance languages, the word can refer both to the element and to coal.

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« Reply #119 on: September 06, 2007, 09:25:22 pm »


Nanotube Manipulation.


On the bottom we show another example of how a nanotube can be manipulated to form complex shapes: the 6 frames are a series of AFM images of a nanotube (orange) on a silicon substrate (blue). Not all steps are shown. The AFM tip is used to create the Greek letter "theta" from a 2.5 micron long nanotube.
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