1 00:00:04,400 --> 00:00:07,800 Speaker 1: Welcome to text Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 2 00:00:12,039 --> 00:00:14,800 Speaker 1: Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 3 00:00:15,000 --> 00:00:18,360 Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio 4 00:00:18,560 --> 00:00:22,160 Speaker 1: and I love all things tech. And if you guys 5 00:00:22,200 --> 00:00:24,960 Speaker 1: have listened to tech Stuff or any real length of time, 6 00:00:25,400 --> 00:00:28,840 Speaker 1: you know that I talk a lot about how miniaturization 7 00:00:29,200 --> 00:00:33,360 Speaker 1: really changed everything. You could argue it fueled a new 8 00:00:33,400 --> 00:00:39,680 Speaker 1: industrial revolution. So in the early twentieth century, technology like radios, televisions, 9 00:00:39,680 --> 00:00:43,240 Speaker 1: and computers were all bigger because they had to be, 10 00:00:43,240 --> 00:00:47,400 Speaker 1: because the internal components inside these technologies, the things that 11 00:00:47,880 --> 00:00:53,280 Speaker 1: made these technologies work, were themselves much larger. That's why 12 00:00:53,400 --> 00:00:55,600 Speaker 1: you would buy a television that had a tiny ten 13 00:00:55,720 --> 00:00:59,320 Speaker 1: inch screen housed inside a cabinet large enough to be 14 00:00:59,480 --> 00:01:03,320 Speaker 1: a full piece of furniture. The invention of the transistor 15 00:01:03,480 --> 00:01:06,759 Speaker 1: would lead to manturization, and in less than one years 16 00:01:06,760 --> 00:01:09,200 Speaker 1: we would find ourselves holding a device in our hands 17 00:01:09,640 --> 00:01:13,319 Speaker 1: that was vastly more powerful than the massive computers that 18 00:01:13,360 --> 00:01:17,399 Speaker 1: took up entire floors of buildings back in the day. 19 00:01:17,440 --> 00:01:21,000 Speaker 1: But what if we keep going down that path. What 20 00:01:21,080 --> 00:01:25,360 Speaker 1: if we were to mantorize things even more? What if 21 00:01:25,400 --> 00:01:28,800 Speaker 1: we could get technology down to a scale so small 22 00:01:29,319 --> 00:01:32,160 Speaker 1: that it would be too tiny for us to see. 23 00:01:32,600 --> 00:01:37,040 Speaker 1: What have we conquered the nano scale? So in today's episode, 24 00:01:37,280 --> 00:01:41,560 Speaker 1: I'm going to explain what nanotechnology is all about and 25 00:01:41,600 --> 00:01:44,679 Speaker 1: how the idea evolved, and a bit about where we 26 00:01:44,720 --> 00:01:47,840 Speaker 1: are now. We'll also talk about how stuff gets really 27 00:01:48,320 --> 00:01:52,280 Speaker 1: weird when you get really small, which I think any 28 00:01:52,320 --> 00:01:55,640 Speaker 1: toddler would attest to, but I mean, it gets really 29 00:01:55,760 --> 00:01:59,920 Speaker 1: weird when you get really small. In fact, if you 30 00:02:00,080 --> 00:02:04,080 Speaker 1: want to get super lucy goosey with the term nanotechnology, 31 00:02:04,120 --> 00:02:06,800 Speaker 1: it gives us a chance to talk about those weird 32 00:02:06,840 --> 00:02:13,320 Speaker 1: things right now. But first a definition. Technically speaking, nanotechnology 33 00:02:13,480 --> 00:02:17,120 Speaker 1: encompasses tech that is on a size scale of one 34 00:02:17,400 --> 00:02:22,840 Speaker 1: d nanometers or smaller down to one nanometer. A nanometer 35 00:02:23,280 --> 00:02:27,320 Speaker 1: is one billionth of a meter. A strand of human 36 00:02:27,440 --> 00:02:33,160 Speaker 1: hair ranges between eighty thousand and one hundred thousand nanometers 37 00:02:33,200 --> 00:02:36,240 Speaker 1: in width. So if you take one of your hairs 38 00:02:36,680 --> 00:02:39,480 Speaker 1: because you can't take mine I'm bald, and you were 39 00:02:39,520 --> 00:02:42,720 Speaker 1: to hold your hair and look at how wide that 40 00:02:42,880 --> 00:02:46,919 Speaker 1: strand of hair is, not how long? How wide? That's 41 00:02:47,280 --> 00:02:51,679 Speaker 1: eight thousand to ten thousand times wider than what we're 42 00:02:51,720 --> 00:02:56,800 Speaker 1: talking about here. In addition, we often think of nanotechnology 43 00:02:56,880 --> 00:03:00,079 Speaker 1: today as being a branch of science and tech that 44 00:03:00,240 --> 00:03:03,799 Speaker 1: is exploring the possibility of manipulating matter on the molecular 45 00:03:04,000 --> 00:03:07,840 Speaker 1: or even atomic scale. The classic example of this in 46 00:03:07,880 --> 00:03:11,480 Speaker 1: science fiction is the universal Assembler, a device that can 47 00:03:11,520 --> 00:03:16,800 Speaker 1: construct macro sized objects atom by atom or molecule by molecule. 48 00:03:17,320 --> 00:03:20,079 Speaker 1: And we'll cover those in more detail a little bit later, 49 00:03:20,120 --> 00:03:22,960 Speaker 1: but this is sort of how the replicators are on 50 00:03:23,080 --> 00:03:25,880 Speaker 1: Star Trek are supposed to work. Right, You say t 51 00:03:26,160 --> 00:03:30,120 Speaker 1: earl gray hot, and then the device takes all the 52 00:03:30,200 --> 00:03:33,400 Speaker 1: atoms that are necessary to make that, puts them together 53 00:03:33,639 --> 00:03:36,960 Speaker 1: right there when you're waiting, and boom, you have t 54 00:03:37,320 --> 00:03:39,880 Speaker 1: on demand. But we don't have to wait until the 55 00:03:39,920 --> 00:03:44,440 Speaker 1: twenty second century to talk about our work in nanotechnology. 56 00:03:44,480 --> 00:03:47,280 Speaker 1: In fact, we can go back more than three thousand 57 00:03:47,440 --> 00:03:51,320 Speaker 1: years ago in China and talk about lamp black. Now, 58 00:03:51,360 --> 00:03:55,520 Speaker 1: this material is a byproduct of burning oil, typically a 59 00:03:55,640 --> 00:04:00,120 Speaker 1: coal based oil, and burning oil in a shallow and 60 00:04:00,680 --> 00:04:04,040 Speaker 1: where you produce really heavy smoke was the typical production 61 00:04:04,080 --> 00:04:07,440 Speaker 1: method for lamp black. You would use a collection pan 62 00:04:07,880 --> 00:04:11,760 Speaker 1: that you would put near the flame, and the collection 63 00:04:11,800 --> 00:04:16,000 Speaker 1: pan begins to accumulate very small particles of carbon they 64 00:04:16,000 --> 00:04:20,360 Speaker 1: are deposited on that pan. Some of those particles are 65 00:04:20,400 --> 00:04:25,919 Speaker 1: around twenty nanometers in diameter. So the lamp black has 66 00:04:26,000 --> 00:04:31,440 Speaker 1: a pretty phenomenal surface area to volume ratio, right, because 67 00:04:31,880 --> 00:04:36,360 Speaker 1: the particles are very small, So there's more of the 68 00:04:36,400 --> 00:04:39,960 Speaker 1: surface of the particle exposed to the air than there 69 00:04:40,160 --> 00:04:43,120 Speaker 1: is under the surface. One way to think about this 70 00:04:43,160 --> 00:04:46,560 Speaker 1: is if you have a gold brick that has a 71 00:04:46,600 --> 00:04:49,599 Speaker 1: certain amount of surface that's exposed to the air. Right, 72 00:04:49,839 --> 00:04:52,760 Speaker 1: But if you were to make that gold brick into 73 00:04:52,839 --> 00:04:56,280 Speaker 1: gold foil, right, if you were to flatten it out 74 00:04:56,640 --> 00:04:59,520 Speaker 1: so that it's much much, much much wider, much much longer, 75 00:04:59,560 --> 00:05:02,400 Speaker 1: but very e than well, now, way more of the 76 00:05:02,440 --> 00:05:06,160 Speaker 1: surface of that gold is exposed to the outside world 77 00:05:06,520 --> 00:05:09,760 Speaker 1: as a much larger amount of surface area compared to 78 00:05:09,839 --> 00:05:12,599 Speaker 1: its volume. Well, that's kind of how things are on 79 00:05:12,600 --> 00:05:17,160 Speaker 1: the nano scale. Nanoparticles have way more surface area exposed 80 00:05:17,200 --> 00:05:20,400 Speaker 1: to the world compared to their volume than stuff that's 81 00:05:20,440 --> 00:05:22,960 Speaker 1: on the macro scale. All right, let's get back to 82 00:05:23,040 --> 00:05:26,960 Speaker 1: lamp black. So because of this amazing amount of surface area, 83 00:05:27,120 --> 00:05:31,200 Speaker 1: it became a very popular black pigment for inks. And paints. 84 00:05:31,600 --> 00:05:33,240 Speaker 1: You didn't need a lot of it in order to 85 00:05:33,320 --> 00:05:36,640 Speaker 1: be able to cover a surface. Well, if it's black, 86 00:05:36,920 --> 00:05:40,120 Speaker 1: then you could use that to be an ink. Right 87 00:05:40,520 --> 00:05:43,960 Speaker 1: centuries later, this same sort of stuff, which we typically 88 00:05:44,040 --> 00:05:47,880 Speaker 1: now call carbon black, is used in all kinds of applications, 89 00:05:47,960 --> 00:05:52,600 Speaker 1: including printer toner. So even to this day we're using 90 00:05:52,640 --> 00:05:56,400 Speaker 1: the same sort of stuff, these tiny, tiny particles of carbon. 91 00:05:57,279 --> 00:06:00,760 Speaker 1: Way back in the three as in the four century 92 00:06:00,800 --> 00:06:05,040 Speaker 1: Common era, some Roman artisan crafted a cup made out 93 00:06:05,080 --> 00:06:08,919 Speaker 1: of glass. Now that in itself isn't incredibly special, but 94 00:06:08,960 --> 00:06:11,800 Speaker 1: this particular cup had a really cool quality to it. 95 00:06:12,160 --> 00:06:15,039 Speaker 1: So let's say you had the glass sitting on a 96 00:06:15,080 --> 00:06:18,600 Speaker 1: table and you placed an oil lamp in front of 97 00:06:18,720 --> 00:06:22,000 Speaker 1: the glass, so it's between you and the glass. Then 98 00:06:22,120 --> 00:06:24,440 Speaker 1: to you, the glass would appear to be green. But 99 00:06:24,520 --> 00:06:26,560 Speaker 1: let's say you position the glass so that the light 100 00:06:26,600 --> 00:06:30,400 Speaker 1: from the oil lamp was actually going into the glass 101 00:06:30,520 --> 00:06:33,920 Speaker 1: rather than onto it. Well, now the glass would appear 102 00:06:33,960 --> 00:06:38,120 Speaker 1: to be red. The color of the glass changes depending 103 00:06:38,200 --> 00:06:42,479 Speaker 1: upon how light hits it. Now today we call the 104 00:06:42,480 --> 00:06:45,720 Speaker 1: glass by the name the Lakergus cup, and you can 105 00:06:45,760 --> 00:06:48,160 Speaker 1: see the Lakergus cup if you ever go into the 106 00:06:48,200 --> 00:06:52,960 Speaker 1: British Museum. Maybe not right now, but you know, things 107 00:06:53,000 --> 00:06:54,760 Speaker 1: being what they are, but when things get better, you 108 00:06:54,800 --> 00:06:57,200 Speaker 1: could see it there. That's where the cup is. It's 109 00:06:57,200 --> 00:07:00,400 Speaker 1: called the Lakergus cup because the figure on the cup 110 00:07:00,560 --> 00:07:04,000 Speaker 1: is that of King like Urgus. He's being dragged into 111 00:07:04,040 --> 00:07:08,200 Speaker 1: the underworld by the nymph ambrosia. So that's fun. So 112 00:07:08,320 --> 00:07:10,680 Speaker 1: why does the glass change color and what does it 113 00:07:10,760 --> 00:07:14,000 Speaker 1: have to do with nanotechnology? The answers had to wait 114 00:07:14,080 --> 00:07:18,040 Speaker 1: more than fifteen hundred years before we really sussed it out. 115 00:07:18,640 --> 00:07:23,840 Speaker 1: In n scientists used an atomic force microscope more on 116 00:07:24,080 --> 00:07:27,080 Speaker 1: those later to examine the like Hurgis cup, and they 117 00:07:27,120 --> 00:07:33,120 Speaker 1: found that this glass contained extremely tiny particles of copper, gold, 118 00:07:33,160 --> 00:07:37,560 Speaker 1: and silver. The particles were in the nanoscale range, and 119 00:07:37,560 --> 00:07:40,120 Speaker 1: they were mixed in with the glass itself. The red 120 00:07:40,200 --> 00:07:44,280 Speaker 1: light came from gold's absorption of light. The glass was 121 00:07:44,760 --> 00:07:50,520 Speaker 1: a type of nanocomposite material. In the following centuries, glassmakers 122 00:07:50,560 --> 00:07:54,080 Speaker 1: would experiment by adding different types of metals to glass 123 00:07:54,120 --> 00:07:57,320 Speaker 1: mixtures to produce various colors of glass a k A 124 00:07:57,680 --> 00:08:01,000 Speaker 1: stained glass. But while we were are able to grind 125 00:08:01,080 --> 00:08:03,760 Speaker 1: stuff down to such a fine powder as to have 126 00:08:04,000 --> 00:08:08,800 Speaker 1: individual particles on the nano scale suspended in glass. It 127 00:08:08,840 --> 00:08:12,360 Speaker 1: wasn't like we were building machines at that same scale. 128 00:08:12,480 --> 00:08:16,400 Speaker 1: That would have been unthinkable. In fact, I would argue 129 00:08:16,440 --> 00:08:20,080 Speaker 1: that before the transistor, most folks weren't really thinking about 130 00:08:20,120 --> 00:08:24,360 Speaker 1: going small with technology. Before the electronic era, we were 131 00:08:24,400 --> 00:08:28,600 Speaker 1: building mechanical systems, and generally the power of machines scaled 132 00:08:28,960 --> 00:08:32,240 Speaker 1: with their size. You could do stuff with gear ratios 133 00:08:32,280 --> 00:08:34,960 Speaker 1: to help boost output without making an entire piece of 134 00:08:35,000 --> 00:08:39,000 Speaker 1: technology bigger, but that only worked down to a certain point. 135 00:08:39,600 --> 00:08:43,160 Speaker 1: In the early era of computers, even as we moved 136 00:08:43,200 --> 00:08:47,680 Speaker 1: from the electro mechanical systems to pure electronic ones, the 137 00:08:47,760 --> 00:08:51,360 Speaker 1: general thought was that the more powerful machines of tomorrow 138 00:08:51,800 --> 00:08:55,040 Speaker 1: would be at least the same size, if not larger, 139 00:08:55,240 --> 00:08:59,160 Speaker 1: than the behemoths of that era. Mantorization was something that 140 00:08:59,760 --> 00:09:03,720 Speaker 1: most people just didn't really anticipate. That, by the way, 141 00:09:04,240 --> 00:09:06,400 Speaker 1: is something that we should keep in mind whenever we 142 00:09:06,440 --> 00:09:09,920 Speaker 1: make any predictions about the future, is that frequently things 143 00:09:09,960 --> 00:09:13,640 Speaker 1: we don't anticipate will end up being a much larger 144 00:09:14,200 --> 00:09:18,000 Speaker 1: influence on the way technology develops than what is currently 145 00:09:18,080 --> 00:09:22,080 Speaker 1: going on. So in the nineteen twenties, if you were 146 00:09:22,120 --> 00:09:24,640 Speaker 1: predicting what the future of technology was going to be, 147 00:09:25,120 --> 00:09:29,439 Speaker 1: You probably weren't thinking in terms of electronics. That was unanticipated. 148 00:09:29,960 --> 00:09:33,480 Speaker 1: And just like if we project out now, we say 149 00:09:33,760 --> 00:09:35,520 Speaker 1: was it going to be like fifty years from now? 150 00:09:36,080 --> 00:09:38,840 Speaker 1: If we're basing it on the technologies we're using right 151 00:09:38,880 --> 00:09:41,680 Speaker 1: at this moment, chances are we're going to miss something 152 00:09:42,320 --> 00:09:44,920 Speaker 1: because it's something we haven't early anticipated that's going to 153 00:09:45,000 --> 00:09:49,360 Speaker 1: change everything between now and then. Okay, anyway, in our 154 00:09:49,400 --> 00:09:53,040 Speaker 1: history we get up to nineteen forty seven when William Shockley, 155 00:09:53,280 --> 00:09:57,680 Speaker 1: Walter Britain, and John Bardine, among others, developed the first 156 00:09:57,800 --> 00:10:01,000 Speaker 1: transistor in a T and T S research and development 157 00:10:01,000 --> 00:10:04,840 Speaker 1: division that would be Bell Labs. The transistor could step 158 00:10:04,880 --> 00:10:07,600 Speaker 1: in and do the job that was previously performed by 159 00:10:07,720 --> 00:10:11,320 Speaker 1: larger components like vacuum tubes. Vacuum tubes are still in 160 00:10:11,400 --> 00:10:16,120 Speaker 1: use today, but the transistors largely replaced them in many technologies. 161 00:10:16,440 --> 00:10:20,640 Speaker 1: So early transistors were large and impractical for any real application. 162 00:10:21,040 --> 00:10:24,640 Speaker 1: They were, you know, a demonstration of a scientific principle, 163 00:10:24,760 --> 00:10:28,200 Speaker 1: but you wouldn't actually use them for something like a radio. However, 164 00:10:28,840 --> 00:10:32,280 Speaker 1: it did prove that the science underlying the transistors was sound, 165 00:10:32,440 --> 00:10:34,600 Speaker 1: and it was only a matter of time before companies 166 00:10:34,640 --> 00:10:38,760 Speaker 1: began to refine the technology and built smaller transistors and 167 00:10:38,800 --> 00:10:42,199 Speaker 1: develop new manufacturing processes to do so at a scale 168 00:10:42,440 --> 00:10:45,480 Speaker 1: large enough for them to be actually be useful. We'll 169 00:10:45,520 --> 00:10:49,640 Speaker 1: get to a famous observation that Gordon Moore made because 170 00:10:49,800 --> 00:10:52,720 Speaker 1: of this particular trend in a little bit, but there's 171 00:10:52,760 --> 00:10:55,800 Speaker 1: another person that I need to talk about first. In 172 00:10:55,920 --> 00:11:00,679 Speaker 1: nineteen fifty nine, physicist Richard Feynman gave a presentation at 173 00:11:00,679 --> 00:11:05,040 Speaker 1: the American Physical Society at the California Institute of Technology 174 00:11:05,080 --> 00:11:09,240 Speaker 1: also known as cal Tech. He called the presentation There's 175 00:11:09,320 --> 00:11:13,200 Speaker 1: plenty of room at the bottom. It would retroactively become 176 00:11:13,320 --> 00:11:17,720 Speaker 1: one of the foundational arguments in support of nanotechnology, the 177 00:11:17,840 --> 00:11:20,920 Speaker 1: discipline and the pursuit of it. Now, it helps if 178 00:11:20,960 --> 00:11:24,320 Speaker 1: we understand how things had developed by the time Feinman 179 00:11:24,440 --> 00:11:28,560 Speaker 1: gave this talk. It took centuries for humans to develop 180 00:11:28,600 --> 00:11:31,560 Speaker 1: technologies that allowed us to observe the world of the 181 00:11:31,720 --> 00:11:37,760 Speaker 1: very small. From magnifying glasses to microscopes, we gradually peeled 182 00:11:37,800 --> 00:11:41,400 Speaker 1: back the unknown, and we kept finding, to our amazement 183 00:11:41,800 --> 00:11:46,360 Speaker 1: that things could get even smaller. But light based or 184 00:11:46,559 --> 00:11:52,520 Speaker 1: optical microscopes have fundamental limitations that are dictated by physics. 185 00:11:53,080 --> 00:11:56,319 Speaker 1: It's not because the limitations of the materials we used. 186 00:11:56,320 --> 00:11:59,600 Speaker 1: It's not that we couldn't find clearer lenses or anything. 187 00:12:00,080 --> 00:12:03,400 Speaker 1: It's rather due to the fact that light waves themselves 188 00:12:03,400 --> 00:12:07,439 Speaker 1: have limitations. Now, we can see stuff because light bounces 189 00:12:07,520 --> 00:12:11,280 Speaker 1: off of it, and light waves are very short. They 190 00:12:11,320 --> 00:12:16,679 Speaker 1: are tiny, but they're not as tiny as say, individual atoms. 191 00:12:17,280 --> 00:12:20,320 Speaker 1: Light waves are too big to reflect off of stuff 192 00:12:20,360 --> 00:12:24,600 Speaker 1: as small as atoms and most molecules, and so no 193 00:12:24,640 --> 00:12:28,840 Speaker 1: matter how good your optical microscope is, you're not going 194 00:12:28,880 --> 00:12:32,400 Speaker 1: to be able to resolve images at that smallest scale 195 00:12:32,920 --> 00:12:36,320 Speaker 1: just because you're using light. Typically you'd be relying on 196 00:12:36,440 --> 00:12:41,640 Speaker 1: light with wavelengths of between four hundred and seven hundred nanometers. 197 00:12:41,640 --> 00:12:46,520 Speaker 1: But that's way larger than stuff like proteins or some viruses, 198 00:12:46,640 --> 00:12:50,160 Speaker 1: and and way way larger than atoms. If you want 199 00:12:50,200 --> 00:12:53,719 Speaker 1: to observe these smaller things, you got to shed your 200 00:12:53,760 --> 00:12:58,920 Speaker 1: dependence on light. Back in nineteen twenty six, a German 201 00:12:59,000 --> 00:13:04,600 Speaker 1: scientist named Hans Bush developed the first electromagnetic lens. This 202 00:13:04,800 --> 00:13:07,079 Speaker 1: isn't the same sort of lens you would find in 203 00:13:07,240 --> 00:13:11,319 Speaker 1: eyeglasses or a telescope or a microscope. Instead, it was 204 00:13:11,360 --> 00:13:14,960 Speaker 1: a couple of electro magnets which could generate a magnetic 205 00:13:15,080 --> 00:13:19,680 Speaker 1: field sufficient to direct a beam of magnetically charged particles. 206 00:13:20,280 --> 00:13:23,920 Speaker 1: This is the same sort of idea used in particle accelerators. 207 00:13:23,960 --> 00:13:27,320 Speaker 1: In a particle accelerator, you've got these big, powerful magnets 208 00:13:27,360 --> 00:13:31,760 Speaker 1: that create an extremely narrow channel through which charged particles 209 00:13:31,800 --> 00:13:34,360 Speaker 1: can travel. They can't go outside of it because of 210 00:13:34,360 --> 00:13:38,240 Speaker 1: these magnetic forces, and it guides the particles around a 211 00:13:38,320 --> 00:13:41,400 Speaker 1: pathway so that they can collide with something else, such 212 00:13:41,400 --> 00:13:44,240 Speaker 1: as a beam of charged particles that are traveling in 213 00:13:44,280 --> 00:13:48,760 Speaker 1: the opposite direction. Now, Bush proposed using the lens to 214 00:13:48,880 --> 00:13:52,360 Speaker 1: make a microscope that would use electrons rather than light, 215 00:13:52,840 --> 00:13:56,640 Speaker 1: and electromagnetic coils rather than a glass lens. He even 216 00:13:56,679 --> 00:14:00,400 Speaker 1: patented a design, but he never constructed the electron micro scope. 217 00:14:01,000 --> 00:14:05,280 Speaker 1: Max Knell, an electrical engineer, and Ernst risk a physicist, 218 00:14:05,720 --> 00:14:09,600 Speaker 1: did build one in ninety one, though this early version 219 00:14:10,120 --> 00:14:12,720 Speaker 1: wasn't able to produce an image that was at a 220 00:14:12,800 --> 00:14:16,199 Speaker 1: higher resolution than what you could achieve with an optical microscope. 221 00:14:16,559 --> 00:14:20,240 Speaker 1: Those would come not that much longer down the road. However, 222 00:14:20,960 --> 00:14:23,880 Speaker 1: the sample that you're looking at has to be inside 223 00:14:23,960 --> 00:14:27,640 Speaker 1: a vacuum chamber, because air molecules would be like giant 224 00:14:27,680 --> 00:14:31,280 Speaker 1: obstacles to an electron beam, and you wouldn't look at 225 00:14:31,320 --> 00:14:33,840 Speaker 1: it through an eyepiece, you know, it's not like that 226 00:14:33,880 --> 00:14:37,480 Speaker 1: type of microscope. Instead, you would capture the interactions of 227 00:14:37,480 --> 00:14:40,920 Speaker 1: the electron beam with the sample you're examining on either 228 00:14:41,040 --> 00:14:45,120 Speaker 1: special photographic film or later on a monitor. So typically 229 00:14:45,160 --> 00:14:47,480 Speaker 1: you would have a sensor and then the sensor would 230 00:14:47,480 --> 00:14:52,360 Speaker 1: send data that you would then interpret visually through a monitor. 231 00:14:53,000 --> 00:14:55,520 Speaker 1: By the time Feynman gave his presentation in the late 232 00:14:55,600 --> 00:14:59,400 Speaker 1: nineteen fifties, electron microscopes could produce images at a much 233 00:14:59,440 --> 00:15:04,480 Speaker 1: smaller scale than optical microscopes. What scientists had learned from 234 00:15:04,600 --> 00:15:08,440 Speaker 1: mathematics was actually beginning to bear out through observation. So 235 00:15:08,480 --> 00:15:12,760 Speaker 1: sometimes we discover stuff because mathematically we understand that it 236 00:15:12,840 --> 00:15:15,480 Speaker 1: has to be a certain way, even if we can't 237 00:15:15,560 --> 00:15:18,760 Speaker 1: directly observe that way. That was kind of what was 238 00:15:18,800 --> 00:15:21,400 Speaker 1: going on. We had sort of sussed out how the 239 00:15:21,440 --> 00:15:24,040 Speaker 1: world had to be at that scale, and now we 240 00:15:24,080 --> 00:15:26,960 Speaker 1: could actually directly observe it and learn even more. We 241 00:15:27,040 --> 00:15:30,480 Speaker 1: appeared to be on the cusp of another major breakthrough. 242 00:15:31,080 --> 00:15:34,359 Speaker 1: The crux of Fineman's presentation was all about the manipulation 243 00:15:34,400 --> 00:15:37,560 Speaker 1: and controlling of the world on the small scale. He 244 00:15:37,640 --> 00:15:40,720 Speaker 1: started off by talking about the possibility of printing something 245 00:15:40,800 --> 00:15:43,640 Speaker 1: like a full encyclopedia onto the head of a pen. 246 00:15:44,080 --> 00:15:47,600 Speaker 1: Then he elaborated from there. He talked about the possibility 247 00:15:47,600 --> 00:15:51,760 Speaker 1: of printing twenty four million books, which he estimated to 248 00:15:51,760 --> 00:15:55,240 Speaker 1: be about the number of notable books ever written, and 249 00:15:55,480 --> 00:15:58,840 Speaker 1: printing them onto the equivalent of thirty five sheets of 250 00:15:58,920 --> 00:16:02,880 Speaker 1: paper by making the print that tiny. His point was 251 00:16:03,160 --> 00:16:05,840 Speaker 1: all about scale, that the scale of things we deal 252 00:16:05,880 --> 00:16:09,280 Speaker 1: with in our everyday lives is gargantuan compared to what 253 00:16:09,320 --> 00:16:11,840 Speaker 1: we could study with the help of powerful technologies like 254 00:16:11,920 --> 00:16:16,240 Speaker 1: electron microscopes. He went on to hypothesize that if we 255 00:16:16,240 --> 00:16:20,920 Speaker 1: were to develop a means of manipulating single atoms, you 256 00:16:21,000 --> 00:16:25,440 Speaker 1: could encode information using some form of simple system. He 257 00:16:25,520 --> 00:16:28,480 Speaker 1: likened it to the dots and dashes in Morse code, 258 00:16:28,880 --> 00:16:31,240 Speaker 1: and you could use it in a three dimensional space 259 00:16:31,360 --> 00:16:34,400 Speaker 1: for each character, and it would measure five by five 260 00:16:34,440 --> 00:16:38,240 Speaker 1: by five atoms to a bit of information, and even 261 00:16:38,280 --> 00:16:41,760 Speaker 1: while using additional atoms for separation, you could print the 262 00:16:41,800 --> 00:16:45,240 Speaker 1: equivalent of those twenty four million volumes on a particle 263 00:16:45,360 --> 00:16:49,360 Speaker 1: the size of a moat of dust. Feynman then goes 264 00:16:49,400 --> 00:16:52,920 Speaker 1: on to suggest even more radical ideas, including using evaporation 265 00:16:52,960 --> 00:16:56,600 Speaker 1: to reduce materials down to their smallest components, before then 266 00:16:56,680 --> 00:17:00,640 Speaker 1: depositing those materials onto a substrate to build out wires 267 00:17:00,720 --> 00:17:03,960 Speaker 1: and insulation and entire circuits. This way. Now, this is 268 00:17:04,000 --> 00:17:06,840 Speaker 1: pretty similar to how we would make stuff like computer 269 00:17:06,920 --> 00:17:10,880 Speaker 1: chips in the future, once we got all those technologies 270 00:17:10,920 --> 00:17:13,919 Speaker 1: down to work on the nano scale. Fineman goes on 271 00:17:14,000 --> 00:17:16,880 Speaker 1: in his presentation to propose the possibility that we could 272 00:17:16,880 --> 00:17:21,160 Speaker 1: build mechanical systems at the nano scale, using the example 273 00:17:21,240 --> 00:17:24,159 Speaker 1: of an automobile, saying how would it be possible to 274 00:17:24,160 --> 00:17:27,879 Speaker 1: build that on this very tiny scale? He argued that 275 00:17:28,000 --> 00:17:31,240 Speaker 1: such a thing might be hypothetically possible, but it would 276 00:17:31,280 --> 00:17:34,679 Speaker 1: require some big changes in automobile design, and a tiny 277 00:17:34,720 --> 00:17:39,280 Speaker 1: scale heat would dissipate much faster than at the macro scale. Again, 278 00:17:39,280 --> 00:17:42,640 Speaker 1: you've got an incredible amount of surface area compared to volume, 279 00:17:43,040 --> 00:17:46,280 Speaker 1: so an internal combustion engine wouldn't work. You wouldn't be 280 00:17:46,280 --> 00:17:49,640 Speaker 1: able to get combustion. You would need some other sort 281 00:17:49,680 --> 00:17:53,919 Speaker 1: of reaction to provide the energy needed to do work. Ultimately, 282 00:17:54,240 --> 00:17:56,800 Speaker 1: Feynman suggested we might find a way to build such 283 00:17:56,920 --> 00:18:00,399 Speaker 1: small devices as to be able to assemble matter atom 284 00:18:00,560 --> 00:18:04,800 Speaker 1: by atom, building with precision on an atomic level, and 285 00:18:05,280 --> 00:18:10,399 Speaker 1: that could create countless possible applications, including being able to 286 00:18:10,440 --> 00:18:14,560 Speaker 1: synthesize chemicals, which previously we had to do through chemical synthesis, 287 00:18:15,119 --> 00:18:20,120 Speaker 1: which is not necessarily as precise and fascinating idea. I'll 288 00:18:20,160 --> 00:18:22,400 Speaker 1: talk a bit more about it, but first let's take 289 00:18:22,600 --> 00:18:34,480 Speaker 1: a quick break. Fineman imagined a macro sized tool that 290 00:18:34,520 --> 00:18:38,479 Speaker 1: could make essentially the parts to replicate itself, but on 291 00:18:38,520 --> 00:18:42,000 Speaker 1: a much smaller scale. So imagine using a tool like 292 00:18:42,160 --> 00:18:44,840 Speaker 1: a lathe to cut out all the parts for a 293 00:18:44,920 --> 00:18:48,560 Speaker 1: smaller version of the lathe. Then you use this smaller 294 00:18:48,680 --> 00:18:52,040 Speaker 1: lathe to cut out even smaller parts for an even 295 00:18:52,080 --> 00:18:55,840 Speaker 1: smaller lathe, and so on, and then using these tiny 296 00:18:55,920 --> 00:19:00,399 Speaker 1: tools to produce what Fineman called tiny hands to a symbol, 297 00:19:00,680 --> 00:19:04,320 Speaker 1: very small components. But then he said, we'd start to 298 00:19:04,400 --> 00:19:08,520 Speaker 1: encounter some challenges that don't exist in any appreciable way 299 00:19:08,680 --> 00:19:11,920 Speaker 1: on the macro scale. For example, once you get down 300 00:19:12,000 --> 00:19:15,400 Speaker 1: to the molecular level, you begin to encounter forces that 301 00:19:15,520 --> 00:19:19,440 Speaker 1: you just don't notice at larger scales, forces like the 302 00:19:19,520 --> 00:19:24,600 Speaker 1: Vanderwall's forces. These are electric forces that attract neutral molecules 303 00:19:24,600 --> 00:19:28,320 Speaker 1: to one another. They are pretty weak forces, but when 304 00:19:28,320 --> 00:19:31,199 Speaker 1: you get down to the molecular level, the forces are 305 00:19:31,240 --> 00:19:34,960 Speaker 1: strong enough to cause issues. So he said, if you 306 00:19:35,000 --> 00:19:38,000 Speaker 1: were to create the equivalent of a nut and bolt 307 00:19:38,320 --> 00:19:41,720 Speaker 1: at the nano scale, you would find the Vanderwall's force 308 00:19:41,880 --> 00:19:44,520 Speaker 1: strong enough that you would have trouble turning the nut 309 00:19:45,080 --> 00:19:47,760 Speaker 1: like it would be difficult to tighten or loosen it 310 00:19:47,840 --> 00:19:51,800 Speaker 1: because it would be clinging to the bolt due to 311 00:19:51,840 --> 00:19:55,320 Speaker 1: the Vanderwall's force between the two. Now that's just the beginning. 312 00:19:55,359 --> 00:19:57,399 Speaker 1: Of course. When you get down to the nano scale, 313 00:19:57,440 --> 00:19:59,880 Speaker 1: you start to enter into a world governed more by 314 00:20:00,040 --> 00:20:03,040 Speaker 1: quantum mechanics then the classical physics that you and I 315 00:20:03,119 --> 00:20:07,320 Speaker 1: encounter in our day to day lives. Weird stuff starts 316 00:20:07,359 --> 00:20:10,320 Speaker 1: to happen. At least it's weird to us because we 317 00:20:10,400 --> 00:20:14,399 Speaker 1: don't observe the world working in that way on our scale. So, 318 00:20:14,440 --> 00:20:19,159 Speaker 1: for example, there's the truly weird phenomena of quantum tunneling. 319 00:20:19,720 --> 00:20:22,320 Speaker 1: I'll try to explain this as best I can. So 320 00:20:22,400 --> 00:20:25,879 Speaker 1: let's start with the classical world, because we generally have 321 00:20:25,920 --> 00:20:29,160 Speaker 1: a pretty good handle on that. Imagine you have a 322 00:20:29,200 --> 00:20:32,200 Speaker 1: toy car, like a little matchbox car, and you've set 323 00:20:32,280 --> 00:20:36,040 Speaker 1: up a ramp, and you probably understand that unless you 324 00:20:36,200 --> 00:20:39,840 Speaker 1: push the toy car hard enough, it's not gonna make 325 00:20:39,880 --> 00:20:42,720 Speaker 1: it up that ramp. It's not going to spontaneously go 326 00:20:42,840 --> 00:20:46,160 Speaker 1: forward and climb that ramp. If you push too soft, 327 00:20:46,680 --> 00:20:48,480 Speaker 1: then it's going to start going up the ramp and 328 00:20:48,480 --> 00:20:51,919 Speaker 1: then roll back down. So the potential energy of the 329 00:20:52,040 --> 00:20:55,680 Speaker 1: ramp is a certain level. You have to give enough 330 00:20:55,760 --> 00:20:59,000 Speaker 1: kinetic energy to the toy car so it can overcome 331 00:20:59,040 --> 00:21:02,159 Speaker 1: the potential energy g represented by the height and the 332 00:21:02,640 --> 00:21:05,680 Speaker 1: and the slope of the ramp. Now let's say we're 333 00:21:05,720 --> 00:21:10,240 Speaker 1: doing something similar, except instead of a little toy car 334 00:21:10,440 --> 00:21:14,600 Speaker 1: and a ramp, we've got an electron and an electrical field. 335 00:21:15,000 --> 00:21:18,080 Speaker 1: If the energy of the electron is higher than the 336 00:21:18,200 --> 00:21:21,280 Speaker 1: energy level of the electric field, the electron can pass 337 00:21:21,320 --> 00:21:24,399 Speaker 1: through it. But if the electric fields energy is higher, 338 00:21:24,560 --> 00:21:27,280 Speaker 1: the electron will be repelled, just as the toy car 339 00:21:27,600 --> 00:21:29,919 Speaker 1: would roll backward down the ramp if you didn't give 340 00:21:29,960 --> 00:21:33,520 Speaker 1: it a hard enough push. But there's a tiny little problem. 341 00:21:33,640 --> 00:21:36,920 Speaker 1: You see, at the quantum level, we're not talking in absolutes, 342 00:21:37,440 --> 00:21:41,960 Speaker 1: we're actually talking in probabilities. Heisenberg's uncertainty principle explained that 343 00:21:42,119 --> 00:21:45,080 Speaker 1: we'll never know the precise position and momentum of a 344 00:21:45,119 --> 00:21:48,600 Speaker 1: particle like an electron. We can only know a little 345 00:21:48,600 --> 00:21:50,800 Speaker 1: bit about each and then we can work out the 346 00:21:50,800 --> 00:21:54,199 Speaker 1: probability that a given sub atomic particle is in a 347 00:21:54,240 --> 00:21:57,560 Speaker 1: certain position at any given time. So you can actually 348 00:21:57,640 --> 00:22:01,199 Speaker 1: plot this out in a wave function. The peak of 349 00:22:01,240 --> 00:22:06,240 Speaker 1: the wave corresponds with the most likely outcomes, the places 350 00:22:06,320 --> 00:22:09,800 Speaker 1: where the electron is most probably going to be located 351 00:22:09,880 --> 00:22:13,160 Speaker 1: at a given time, but there will be a small 352 00:22:13,280 --> 00:22:16,680 Speaker 1: chance that the electron will appear somewhere else. And if 353 00:22:16,720 --> 00:22:20,199 Speaker 1: the wave function can actually overlap the entirety of the 354 00:22:20,240 --> 00:22:23,560 Speaker 1: electric field, that means that there's a tiny little amount 355 00:22:23,680 --> 00:22:26,520 Speaker 1: of that probability wave on the opposite side of the 356 00:22:26,520 --> 00:22:30,560 Speaker 1: electric field where the electron could exist. The probability is 357 00:22:30,640 --> 00:22:34,600 Speaker 1: very small, but it is there, which means it is 358 00:22:34,680 --> 00:22:37,040 Speaker 1: possible the electron is on the other side of the 359 00:22:37,040 --> 00:22:40,800 Speaker 1: electric field. And if something is possible, then if you 360 00:22:41,320 --> 00:22:44,000 Speaker 1: do that something enough times it means it will happen. 361 00:22:44,600 --> 00:22:48,479 Speaker 1: It probably doesn't happen frequently. The probability tells us it won't, 362 00:22:49,040 --> 00:22:52,200 Speaker 1: but if there is a chance it will happen sooner 363 00:22:52,280 --> 00:22:55,520 Speaker 1: or later, it will. Now, there's a lot more to 364 00:22:55,600 --> 00:22:59,600 Speaker 1: this stuff, like the discussion of evanescent waves, but while 365 00:22:59,600 --> 00:23:03,240 Speaker 1: those make me wake up inside, they are also super 366 00:23:03,240 --> 00:23:07,000 Speaker 1: tricky to explain without visual aids. The important thing for 367 00:23:07,080 --> 00:23:10,320 Speaker 1: us to remember is that if there is a probability 368 00:23:10,359 --> 00:23:14,639 Speaker 1: that something will happen, if you have enough instances, you 369 00:23:14,680 --> 00:23:17,840 Speaker 1: will eventually encounter that. And if that something means an 370 00:23:17,840 --> 00:23:21,480 Speaker 1: electron suddenly appears on the opposite side of a barrier 371 00:23:21,720 --> 00:23:24,760 Speaker 1: where it's not supposed to be, you gotta deal with that. 372 00:23:25,200 --> 00:23:27,879 Speaker 1: So what this means for us in practical terms is 373 00:23:27,920 --> 00:23:31,080 Speaker 1: that if we build stuff down at the nanoscale, we 374 00:23:31,280 --> 00:23:35,200 Speaker 1: have to worry about things like quantum tunneling. So imagine 375 00:23:35,200 --> 00:23:39,000 Speaker 1: you've got an electric circuit with all the components small 376 00:23:39,119 --> 00:23:42,080 Speaker 1: enough that the wave function of the electron means that 377 00:23:42,240 --> 00:23:44,760 Speaker 1: sometimes the electron can be on the other side of 378 00:23:44,840 --> 00:23:48,439 Speaker 1: gates or even in a totally different wire. Well that 379 00:23:48,640 --> 00:23:51,000 Speaker 1: those gates and those wires are meant to control the 380 00:23:51,040 --> 00:23:54,320 Speaker 1: flow of electrons. That's what circuits are. Circuits really are 381 00:23:54,600 --> 00:23:59,960 Speaker 1: controlled pathways for electrical signals, and the important part there 382 00:24:00,080 --> 00:24:02,320 Speaker 1: is the control. If it's uncontrolled, you might as well 383 00:24:02,320 --> 00:24:05,560 Speaker 1: not even have a circuit. So if electrons can just 384 00:24:05,960 --> 00:24:08,520 Speaker 1: appear on the other side of gates as if those 385 00:24:08,560 --> 00:24:11,440 Speaker 1: gates were open, or jump from one wire to the next, 386 00:24:12,000 --> 00:24:15,240 Speaker 1: you've got a problem. You can't actually control electricity in 387 00:24:15,240 --> 00:24:18,679 Speaker 1: a reliable way, you'll start to get errors. Now this 388 00:24:18,760 --> 00:24:22,040 Speaker 1: is something microchip manufacturers actually have to deal with today 389 00:24:22,080 --> 00:24:26,080 Speaker 1: because they keep scaling down. The components on their chips 390 00:24:26,359 --> 00:24:30,960 Speaker 1: were happidly in the five nanometer range at this point, 391 00:24:30,960 --> 00:24:33,520 Speaker 1: which is smaller than I ever thought we would ever 392 00:24:33,600 --> 00:24:36,760 Speaker 1: be able to go, and their talks about possibly getting 393 00:24:36,760 --> 00:24:40,080 Speaker 1: as low as three nanometers or beyond. But we really 394 00:24:40,080 --> 00:24:43,680 Speaker 1: have to answer some big questions about fundamental quantum mechanics 395 00:24:43,720 --> 00:24:46,359 Speaker 1: problems in order to get there. So what the heck 396 00:24:46,359 --> 00:24:48,760 Speaker 1: does this mean if we were to blow it out 397 00:24:48,760 --> 00:24:52,160 Speaker 1: to macro scale. Well, in our example with the toy car, 398 00:24:52,760 --> 00:24:55,400 Speaker 1: it would mean that sometimes, let's just say you give 399 00:24:55,440 --> 00:24:58,960 Speaker 1: the toy car a gentle push, most of the time 400 00:24:59,320 --> 00:25:01,040 Speaker 1: it would just go a little bit up the ramp 401 00:25:01,240 --> 00:25:04,480 Speaker 1: and then roll right back down. However, once in a 402 00:25:04,520 --> 00:25:07,120 Speaker 1: blue moon, you would give it that tiny little tap 403 00:25:07,160 --> 00:25:10,119 Speaker 1: and it would launch itself over the ramp. Other times 404 00:25:10,440 --> 00:25:12,320 Speaker 1: you might give it a tiny little tap and it 405 00:25:12,400 --> 00:25:15,560 Speaker 1: might actually move backward. Most of the time you would 406 00:25:15,560 --> 00:25:18,240 Speaker 1: just see it hit the ramp and roll back. That 407 00:25:18,520 --> 00:25:21,120 Speaker 1: is a challenge. If you're building out a system that 408 00:25:21,200 --> 00:25:25,159 Speaker 1: relies on predictability, and it turns out that your results 409 00:25:25,200 --> 00:25:29,520 Speaker 1: are not always predictable, you've got an issue. Feineman's talk 410 00:25:29,720 --> 00:25:33,680 Speaker 1: did not actually spark some sort of explosive interest in nanotechnology. 411 00:25:33,920 --> 00:25:36,320 Speaker 1: It would take several decades before people would really go 412 00:25:36,400 --> 00:25:38,600 Speaker 1: back to it as a sort of touchstone for the 413 00:25:38,600 --> 00:25:42,600 Speaker 1: whole discipline. But other developments would play a part as well. 414 00:25:43,000 --> 00:25:48,640 Speaker 1: For example, in Gordon Moore's paper about quote cramming more 415 00:25:48,720 --> 00:25:53,040 Speaker 1: components onto integrated circuits in the quote would serve as 416 00:25:53,080 --> 00:25:56,520 Speaker 1: the basis for what we now call Moore's law. Gordy 417 00:25:56,680 --> 00:25:59,399 Speaker 1: saw that the general trend was that a combination of 418 00:25:59,400 --> 00:26:03,560 Speaker 1: factors can tribute to the doubling of components onto a 419 00:26:03,640 --> 00:26:08,000 Speaker 1: square inch of silicon wafer every two years. So if 420 00:26:08,040 --> 00:26:10,640 Speaker 1: you could fit five thousand components on a square inch 421 00:26:10,680 --> 00:26:13,879 Speaker 1: of silicon in nineteen sixty five, for example, by nineteen 422 00:26:13,960 --> 00:26:17,119 Speaker 1: sixty seven, you could fit ten thousand components on that 423 00:26:17,240 --> 00:26:21,560 Speaker 1: same square inch. His observations take into account not just 424 00:26:21,840 --> 00:26:26,440 Speaker 1: technological advancements, but also the economic drivers. And if you've 425 00:26:26,520 --> 00:26:29,560 Speaker 1: never gone through the paper, I highly recommend you check 426 00:26:29,560 --> 00:26:31,320 Speaker 1: it out. The article is worth a read. You can 427 00:26:31,359 --> 00:26:35,160 Speaker 1: find it online for free. We typically dumb it all 428 00:26:35,240 --> 00:26:38,560 Speaker 1: down these days to say that computers double in processing 429 00:26:38,560 --> 00:26:41,600 Speaker 1: power every two years or so. But that's only a 430 00:26:41,640 --> 00:26:44,919 Speaker 1: slice of what Moore was talking about. But how do 431 00:26:45,000 --> 00:26:46,879 Speaker 1: we do this in the first place? How do we 432 00:26:47,040 --> 00:26:51,640 Speaker 1: make machines twice as powerful so regularly? Well, a lot 433 00:26:51,680 --> 00:26:54,400 Speaker 1: of stuff goes into it, But two really big factors 434 00:26:54,680 --> 00:26:58,879 Speaker 1: are circuit architecture, that is, how designers lay out the 435 00:26:58,920 --> 00:27:04,760 Speaker 1: components of a circuit, and the size of the components themselves. Intel, 436 00:27:04,920 --> 00:27:09,080 Speaker 1: which More co founded, has a design philosophy called tick 437 00:27:09,240 --> 00:27:13,320 Speaker 1: talk that lays us out fairly well. In the tike phase, 438 00:27:13,640 --> 00:27:17,840 Speaker 1: engineers figure out how to make smaller components from the 439 00:27:17,880 --> 00:27:23,560 Speaker 1: predecessor generation microchip, but using the same architecture of that predecessor. 440 00:27:23,960 --> 00:27:28,120 Speaker 1: So let's say you join Intel, They're just now going 441 00:27:28,160 --> 00:27:32,399 Speaker 1: into the tick phase of a processor. The previous processor 442 00:27:32,520 --> 00:27:35,760 Speaker 1: was processor number twelve, So your job is to make 443 00:27:35,840 --> 00:27:40,360 Speaker 1: processor number thirteen, and you're taking the architecture of twelve 444 00:27:40,640 --> 00:27:43,560 Speaker 1: and you're essentially copying it, but you're making everything smaller, 445 00:27:43,640 --> 00:27:47,200 Speaker 1: so you're able to fit more components on the same chip, 446 00:27:47,280 --> 00:27:51,199 Speaker 1: but it's following the same general layout as Chip number twelve. 447 00:27:51,600 --> 00:27:56,600 Speaker 1: In the talk phase, designers optimize the architecture for these 448 00:27:56,760 --> 00:28:00,720 Speaker 1: new smaller components so that they work as efficiently as possible. 449 00:28:01,000 --> 00:28:06,080 Speaker 1: So with chip number fourteen, you take the size of 450 00:28:06,119 --> 00:28:08,679 Speaker 1: the components you made for thirteen, but you lay them 451 00:28:08,720 --> 00:28:11,000 Speaker 1: out in a new way so that they work as 452 00:28:11,080 --> 00:28:14,520 Speaker 1: best as possible. When it comes to the next tick phase, 453 00:28:14,680 --> 00:28:17,600 Speaker 1: it all starts over again. So Chip number fifteen is 454 00:28:17,640 --> 00:28:20,679 Speaker 1: going to have the exact same architecture as fourteen, but 455 00:28:20,800 --> 00:28:24,840 Speaker 1: with even smaller components. Tick talk, tick talk. It's all 456 00:28:24,880 --> 00:28:29,359 Speaker 1: about maniaturize, optimized, over and over until you hit some 457 00:28:29,400 --> 00:28:33,560 Speaker 1: sort of fundamental barrier in physics that you are unable 458 00:28:33,560 --> 00:28:36,560 Speaker 1: to work around. And we are headed towards that, but 459 00:28:36,760 --> 00:28:39,320 Speaker 1: we keep on predicting the end of Moore's law and 460 00:28:39,360 --> 00:28:42,160 Speaker 1: we haven't quite hit it. Yet, although you could argue 461 00:28:42,200 --> 00:28:47,160 Speaker 1: that the length of time required has expanded over the years. 462 00:28:47,480 --> 00:28:50,440 Speaker 1: But yeah, so far we have not hit that fundamental 463 00:28:50,560 --> 00:28:53,000 Speaker 1: limit in physics, and we now have microchips that have 464 00:28:53,160 --> 00:28:58,400 Speaker 1: nodes or components that measure in the single digits of nanometers. 465 00:28:58,440 --> 00:29:01,520 Speaker 1: But eventually we will hit that limit, and we'll have 466 00:29:01,600 --> 00:29:03,560 Speaker 1: to come up with other ways to keep up with 467 00:29:03,760 --> 00:29:06,520 Speaker 1: Moore's law or the spirit of Moore's law, or we'll 468 00:29:06,520 --> 00:29:08,400 Speaker 1: finally have to admit that we've reached the limits of 469 00:29:08,480 --> 00:29:10,880 Speaker 1: keeping up with that pace and we'll have to settle 470 00:29:10,920 --> 00:29:14,360 Speaker 1: for a less impressive rate of progress. No matter what, 471 00:29:14,400 --> 00:29:17,680 Speaker 1: we're going to be looking at a different approach to computing, 472 00:29:17,960 --> 00:29:21,200 Speaker 1: or things are really gonna plateau. Now we're going to 473 00:29:21,400 --> 00:29:23,920 Speaker 1: skip ahead to the nineteen eighties because that's when we 474 00:29:24,000 --> 00:29:26,560 Speaker 1: got the development of a technology that really let us 475 00:29:26,600 --> 00:29:28,320 Speaker 1: get a look at stuff that was down on the 476 00:29:28,360 --> 00:29:32,360 Speaker 1: atomic level. The electron microscopes had allowed us to resolve 477 00:29:32,480 --> 00:29:35,960 Speaker 1: samples down to the nanoscale, but we couldn't quite do 478 00:29:36,040 --> 00:29:39,400 Speaker 1: that on the atomic scale. Now atoms are less than 479 00:29:39,480 --> 00:29:43,440 Speaker 1: one nanometer in size. But our abilities got a big 480 00:29:43,480 --> 00:29:49,240 Speaker 1: boost in one when Gerd Binnig and Heinrich Roarer developed 481 00:29:49,240 --> 00:29:54,080 Speaker 1: what is called a scanning tunneling microscope. This microscope uses 482 00:29:54,160 --> 00:29:57,400 Speaker 1: a metal wire that comes to an insanely sharp point 483 00:29:57,920 --> 00:30:01,680 Speaker 1: and it scans above the surface of a sample. The 484 00:30:01,760 --> 00:30:05,680 Speaker 1: microscope applies an electric voltage to either the tip or 485 00:30:05,760 --> 00:30:10,160 Speaker 1: the sample depends on the microscope, and what follows is 486 00:30:10,160 --> 00:30:14,920 Speaker 1: a really complicated process, involving quantum mechanics, primarily the tunneling 487 00:30:15,000 --> 00:30:18,840 Speaker 1: effect I mentioned earlier, and the piece of electric effect 488 00:30:18,880 --> 00:30:21,640 Speaker 1: as well, and it gets way more complicated than I 489 00:30:21,680 --> 00:30:26,320 Speaker 1: can adequately explain or even understand. So rather than stumble 490 00:30:26,360 --> 00:30:29,200 Speaker 1: through an explanation and likely getting a lot of stuff 491 00:30:29,280 --> 00:30:32,000 Speaker 1: wrong along the way, I think it's just important that 492 00:30:32,040 --> 00:30:35,960 Speaker 1: we understand. Using this process made it possible to image 493 00:30:36,080 --> 00:30:41,760 Speaker 1: individual atoms for the first time. This was a monumental achievement, 494 00:30:42,080 --> 00:30:44,680 Speaker 1: so much so that Bennig and Roarer would get a 495 00:30:44,760 --> 00:30:47,520 Speaker 1: Nobel Prize for their work in the field just a 496 00:30:47,520 --> 00:30:51,800 Speaker 1: few years later. Imaging atoms brought us a step closer 497 00:30:51,840 --> 00:30:55,560 Speaker 1: to being able to manipulate individual atoms, but to do 498 00:30:55,640 --> 00:30:58,240 Speaker 1: that it would take nearly a decade. It was a 499 00:30:58,320 --> 00:31:02,000 Speaker 1: night nine when Reese searchers at IBM found that if 500 00:31:02,040 --> 00:31:05,239 Speaker 1: they worked in very low temperatures, and they used a 501 00:31:05,280 --> 00:31:09,440 Speaker 1: scanning tunneling microscope. They cannot just image the surface of 502 00:31:09,440 --> 00:31:13,720 Speaker 1: a sample. They could actually maneuver single atoms into a 503 00:31:13,760 --> 00:31:18,440 Speaker 1: specific place. The researchers used atoms of the element zenon, 504 00:31:19,000 --> 00:31:23,120 Speaker 1: and they use the incredibly precise controls of this microscope 505 00:31:23,200 --> 00:31:26,400 Speaker 1: to move the atoms so that they spelled out the 506 00:31:26,480 --> 00:31:31,120 Speaker 1: letters I, B, M. Cute. Huh. They use thirty five 507 00:31:31,200 --> 00:31:34,520 Speaker 1: atoms to do it. And think about this for a second. 508 00:31:34,560 --> 00:31:37,880 Speaker 1: So let's let's imagine just a speck of dust, which 509 00:31:37,920 --> 00:31:42,800 Speaker 1: is really tiny, right. That might measure just five microns across, 510 00:31:42,840 --> 00:31:46,720 Speaker 1: and a micron is one millionth of a meter. But 511 00:31:46,840 --> 00:31:51,320 Speaker 1: that tiny piece of dust is itself composed of hundreds 512 00:31:51,400 --> 00:31:56,000 Speaker 1: of quadrillions of atoms. I remember it. Atom is smaller 513 00:31:56,040 --> 00:31:59,640 Speaker 1: than a nanometer, and a nanometer is one billionth of 514 00:31:59,640 --> 00:32:03,120 Speaker 1: a me er. So when we talk about moving individual 515 00:32:03,240 --> 00:32:07,480 Speaker 1: atoms around without disturbing the other atoms, it's at a 516 00:32:07,560 --> 00:32:10,560 Speaker 1: level of precision that is impossible for me to imagine. 517 00:32:10,600 --> 00:32:14,680 Speaker 1: I just can't work out how small that is. Between 518 00:32:14,720 --> 00:32:18,280 Speaker 1: the invention of the scanning tunneling microscope and IBM S 519 00:32:18,400 --> 00:32:21,600 Speaker 1: novel use of the technology to spell out its own name. 520 00:32:22,200 --> 00:32:25,440 Speaker 1: We get another innovation smack dab between the two. In 521 00:32:25,560 --> 00:32:29,880 Speaker 1: nineteen eighties six, Christoph Gerber and Calvin Quait invented the 522 00:32:29,880 --> 00:32:33,880 Speaker 1: atomic force microscope. I mentioned that earlier in the episode. 523 00:32:34,640 --> 00:32:38,680 Speaker 1: This thing can image atomic sized particles in three dimensions, 524 00:32:38,720 --> 00:32:41,560 Speaker 1: and it involves reflecting a laser off the end of 525 00:32:41,600 --> 00:32:44,600 Speaker 1: a cantilever with a sharp point at the end of it. 526 00:32:45,200 --> 00:32:48,160 Speaker 1: As this moves across the surface of a sample, the 527 00:32:48,240 --> 00:32:52,960 Speaker 1: attractive and repulsive forces acting on the cantilever change its 528 00:32:52,960 --> 00:32:56,400 Speaker 1: position and angle relative to the laser, so that the 529 00:32:56,520 --> 00:33:00,440 Speaker 1: laser reflecting off of it hits different parts of a sensor, 530 00:33:00,480 --> 00:33:03,400 Speaker 1: and by interpreting that data, we can construct a three 531 00:33:03,440 --> 00:33:06,880 Speaker 1: dimensional image of the sample. This might be hard for 532 00:33:06,880 --> 00:33:09,840 Speaker 1: you to imagine. So let's say it's nighttime and you're 533 00:33:09,880 --> 00:33:13,120 Speaker 1: holding a flashlight so that from your perspective, it's pointed 534 00:33:13,200 --> 00:33:16,600 Speaker 1: straight up into the sky. You're making a vertical line 535 00:33:16,760 --> 00:33:20,840 Speaker 1: of light straight up, and you're walking and as you're 536 00:33:20,840 --> 00:33:23,520 Speaker 1: walking along, you hit the gentle slope of a hill, 537 00:33:23,720 --> 00:33:26,959 Speaker 1: so you start climbing. Your feet are still flat on 538 00:33:27,000 --> 00:33:31,080 Speaker 1: the ground with respect to your position. A person standing 539 00:33:31,120 --> 00:33:33,680 Speaker 1: far away can't see you, it's too dark, but they 540 00:33:33,720 --> 00:33:36,520 Speaker 1: can see the beam of your flashlight, and they'll see 541 00:33:36,560 --> 00:33:40,160 Speaker 1: as this beam of vertical light starts to tilt slightly 542 00:33:40,200 --> 00:33:42,800 Speaker 1: as you hit that slope of the hill, they'll see 543 00:33:42,800 --> 00:33:46,760 Speaker 1: that it's it's turning a little bits, changing orientation. The 544 00:33:46,840 --> 00:33:50,000 Speaker 1: steeper the slope you're walking on, assuming you can maintain 545 00:33:50,240 --> 00:33:53,680 Speaker 1: flat feet on the ground, the greater deviation the person 546 00:33:53,760 --> 00:33:57,880 Speaker 1: will see in that vertical line. Atomic force microscopes are 547 00:33:57,960 --> 00:33:59,960 Speaker 1: kind of doing the same thing, but down on the 548 00:34:00,040 --> 00:34:04,120 Speaker 1: atomic level. They're measuring how this reflected light is changing 549 00:34:04,520 --> 00:34:09,880 Speaker 1: orientation based upon this very very sharp point moving across 550 00:34:10,400 --> 00:34:13,520 Speaker 1: this tiny sample. Now, when we come back, i'll talk 551 00:34:13,520 --> 00:34:24,279 Speaker 1: about some of the disciplines involved with nanotechnology. Today. I 552 00:34:24,400 --> 00:34:27,319 Speaker 1: left off talking about the atomic force microscope that was 553 00:34:27,360 --> 00:34:31,759 Speaker 1: developed back in nine six. That same year, Eric Drexler's 554 00:34:31,800 --> 00:34:36,600 Speaker 1: book Engines of Creation The Coming Era of Nanotechnology published. Now, 555 00:34:36,640 --> 00:34:40,000 Speaker 1: this was the book that really brought Feynman's nineteen fifty 556 00:34:40,120 --> 00:34:44,120 Speaker 1: nine presentation out of obscurity and then built upon it. 557 00:34:44,200 --> 00:34:48,719 Speaker 1: This is the reason why nanotechnology has sort of the 558 00:34:48,840 --> 00:34:53,080 Speaker 1: narrative around it. It's largely due to Drexler's work. So 559 00:34:53,200 --> 00:34:56,680 Speaker 1: in this book, Drexler expanded upon Feineman's ideas, going so 560 00:34:56,719 --> 00:34:58,680 Speaker 1: far as to suggest we would be able to create 561 00:34:58,760 --> 00:35:02,120 Speaker 1: universal assembler. And now we finally can explain what that's 562 00:35:02,160 --> 00:35:05,240 Speaker 1: all about. So a universal assembler would be a device 563 00:35:05,280 --> 00:35:09,560 Speaker 1: capable of building stuff out of individual atoms or molecules, 564 00:35:09,760 --> 00:35:13,400 Speaker 1: and you could use these things to synthesize specific molecules 565 00:35:13,440 --> 00:35:17,799 Speaker 1: through physics instead of chemistry. Moreover, with enough assemblers, you 566 00:35:17,840 --> 00:35:21,320 Speaker 1: could build macro sized objects, stuff that we could actually 567 00:35:21,360 --> 00:35:24,640 Speaker 1: interact with in our own worlds. But then you think, 568 00:35:24,920 --> 00:35:29,000 Speaker 1: if a speck of dust has a few hundred quadrillion 569 00:35:29,120 --> 00:35:32,040 Speaker 1: atoms in it, how long would it take a universal 570 00:35:32,080 --> 00:35:36,040 Speaker 1: assembler to make anything we would even be able to see. Well, 571 00:35:36,040 --> 00:35:38,880 Speaker 1: one thing that could speed up this process would be 572 00:35:39,040 --> 00:35:44,000 Speaker 1: to have universal assemblers that could build more universal assemblers 573 00:35:44,000 --> 00:35:48,040 Speaker 1: out of basic atoms. So the assemblers just start replicating 574 00:35:48,080 --> 00:35:50,879 Speaker 1: themselves over and over. So you start off with two, 575 00:35:50,920 --> 00:35:53,000 Speaker 1: and you get four, and then you have eight and 576 00:35:53,160 --> 00:35:57,200 Speaker 1: sixteen and thirty two, et cetera. That exponential growth means 577 00:35:57,239 --> 00:36:00,719 Speaker 1: that pretty soon you've got an enormous number of assemblers 578 00:36:00,800 --> 00:36:04,839 Speaker 1: all over the place, and collectively, you would think they'd 579 00:36:04,840 --> 00:36:07,200 Speaker 1: be able to construct stuff much more quickly. If they 580 00:36:07,239 --> 00:36:11,640 Speaker 1: had a collective and coordinated a way of building stuff, 581 00:36:12,239 --> 00:36:15,319 Speaker 1: then you could produce things very fast. It's like having 582 00:36:15,360 --> 00:36:18,239 Speaker 1: a three D printer that can make anything out of 583 00:36:18,239 --> 00:36:23,480 Speaker 1: pretty much anything. Drexler also proposed a potential doomsday scenario 584 00:36:23,760 --> 00:36:27,040 Speaker 1: based on this idea, and it's the so called gray 585 00:36:27,280 --> 00:36:32,239 Speaker 1: Goose scenario. The idea is that universal assemblers would malfunction 586 00:36:32,280 --> 00:36:35,200 Speaker 1: in some way so that they just keep making replicas 587 00:36:35,320 --> 00:36:39,239 Speaker 1: of themselves. They're making more universal assemblers, which then make 588 00:36:39,320 --> 00:36:42,359 Speaker 1: more universal assemblers, and it starts to break down all 589 00:36:42,480 --> 00:36:45,640 Speaker 1: other matter just to get the raw materials needed to 590 00:36:45,680 --> 00:36:49,319 Speaker 1: make more universal assemblers, and the process gets faster as 591 00:36:49,360 --> 00:36:51,759 Speaker 1: it goes on because you've got more of them. These 592 00:36:51,760 --> 00:36:56,440 Speaker 1: tiny machines would disassemble anything that wasn't a universal assembler itself, 593 00:36:56,920 --> 00:37:00,520 Speaker 1: and the creation we made would devour us all. For 594 00:37:00,560 --> 00:37:03,279 Speaker 1: the time being, this is purely a thought experiment. We 595 00:37:03,360 --> 00:37:06,239 Speaker 1: are nowhere close to actually making something like this, so 596 00:37:06,920 --> 00:37:10,239 Speaker 1: don't lose any sleep over it. And certain aspects of 597 00:37:10,320 --> 00:37:13,840 Speaker 1: nanotechnology are older than others. For example, we've been making 598 00:37:13,880 --> 00:37:17,280 Speaker 1: mixtures from nanoparticles of certain metals for a really long while. 599 00:37:17,320 --> 00:37:20,920 Speaker 1: As I mentioned earlier in this episode, colloidal silver is 600 00:37:20,960 --> 00:37:23,920 Speaker 1: a really great example. The word colloid comes from chemistry. 601 00:37:24,040 --> 00:37:28,160 Speaker 1: It's a mixture that has very very tiny particles of 602 00:37:28,360 --> 00:37:33,160 Speaker 1: something suspended throughout some other substance. This isn't that different 603 00:37:33,280 --> 00:37:35,120 Speaker 1: from the glass I talked about at the beginning of 604 00:37:35,120 --> 00:37:40,560 Speaker 1: the episode. So silver has antibacterial properties. This is just 605 00:37:40,800 --> 00:37:44,160 Speaker 1: true of that material. Even before humans really knew what 606 00:37:44,280 --> 00:37:47,440 Speaker 1: bacteria were or that they were a thing, they developed 607 00:37:47,440 --> 00:37:50,760 Speaker 1: a general understanding that silver could help ward off stuff 608 00:37:50,840 --> 00:37:54,160 Speaker 1: like infection. Maybe that's why silver also plays a part 609 00:37:54,200 --> 00:37:56,759 Speaker 1: in certain mythologies, such as the idea that you can 610 00:37:56,920 --> 00:38:00,560 Speaker 1: kill a werewolf with silver or some vampire. Our legends 611 00:38:00,600 --> 00:38:04,280 Speaker 1: involved using silver to kill vampires might be the idea 612 00:38:04,320 --> 00:38:08,640 Speaker 1: that silver wards off impurities as it were. Today, companies 613 00:38:08,719 --> 00:38:13,240 Speaker 1: manufacture bandages and wound dressings with silver nano particles woven 614 00:38:13,239 --> 00:38:16,320 Speaker 1: into them to help with healing and to prevent infection. 615 00:38:16,680 --> 00:38:20,720 Speaker 1: Of course, people can take the antibacterial properties of silver 616 00:38:20,920 --> 00:38:24,880 Speaker 1: to extremes. There are folks who have taken courses of 617 00:38:24,960 --> 00:38:28,960 Speaker 1: colloidal silver to treat all sorts of ailments, and this 618 00:38:29,000 --> 00:38:32,480 Speaker 1: can have a particularly noticeable side effect because it can 619 00:38:32,560 --> 00:38:37,360 Speaker 1: turn the skin a sort of bluish color. Silver compounds 620 00:38:37,520 --> 00:38:40,799 Speaker 1: will build up in human cells and this is what 621 00:38:40,920 --> 00:38:44,560 Speaker 1: causes that change in color. There's even a term for 622 00:38:44,600 --> 00:38:49,400 Speaker 1: this condition, argeria. Take a look online for colloidal silver 623 00:38:49,560 --> 00:38:53,240 Speaker 1: and blue skin and you're gonna see some interesting images. 624 00:38:54,080 --> 00:38:55,520 Speaker 1: And I think that's one thing we have to take 625 00:38:55,520 --> 00:38:59,160 Speaker 1: away from the young discipline of nanotechnology. We're still learning 626 00:38:59,239 --> 00:39:02,680 Speaker 1: how stuff works at this scale. If you listen to 627 00:39:02,719 --> 00:39:05,600 Speaker 1: the smart Talks episode I did in which I spoke 628 00:39:05,640 --> 00:39:09,240 Speaker 1: with Dave Turrek of IBM, you heard him talk about 629 00:39:09,360 --> 00:39:14,399 Speaker 1: using high performance computing systems to simulate molecular interactions, all 630 00:39:14,440 --> 00:39:18,120 Speaker 1: with the goal of figuring out treatments for COVID nineteen. Now, 631 00:39:18,160 --> 00:39:21,960 Speaker 1: there are processes that we don't fully understand happening, and 632 00:39:22,040 --> 00:39:25,520 Speaker 1: not just small scales in terms of physical size, but 633 00:39:25,600 --> 00:39:29,400 Speaker 1: also at small time scales. So we humans we measure 634 00:39:29,440 --> 00:39:32,520 Speaker 1: time in seconds, minutes, and hours, but when you're talking 635 00:39:32,600 --> 00:39:36,560 Speaker 1: about atomic and molecular interactions, you might need to look 636 00:39:36,600 --> 00:39:38,919 Speaker 1: at changes that happen over the course of a few 637 00:39:39,000 --> 00:39:43,759 Speaker 1: fempto seconds, and a fempto second is one quadrillionth of 638 00:39:43,800 --> 00:39:46,360 Speaker 1: a second. We've got a lot to learn when it 639 00:39:46,400 --> 00:39:50,120 Speaker 1: comes to the nano scale. Some materials have radically different 640 00:39:50,160 --> 00:39:52,600 Speaker 1: properties when you look at them on the nano scale, 641 00:39:52,800 --> 00:39:57,839 Speaker 1: properties like electrical conductivity, or the materials melting point, or 642 00:39:57,880 --> 00:40:02,239 Speaker 1: it's reactivity, it's chemical react ativity, it's fluorescence, uh, it's 643 00:40:02,280 --> 00:40:05,759 Speaker 1: magnetic permeability. All of those can be very different. It's 644 00:40:05,800 --> 00:40:09,319 Speaker 1: almost like a substance changes identities once you get it 645 00:40:09,360 --> 00:40:13,880 Speaker 1: down to that size. Another one is toxicity. Toxicity is 646 00:40:13,880 --> 00:40:16,560 Speaker 1: another quality we have to take into consideration. It may 647 00:40:16,600 --> 00:40:20,200 Speaker 1: be that something is completely harmless on the macro scale, 648 00:40:20,239 --> 00:40:22,480 Speaker 1: like we would never have any problems if we came 649 00:40:22,480 --> 00:40:27,279 Speaker 1: into contact with it classically, but if we encounter nanoparticles, 650 00:40:27,320 --> 00:40:30,040 Speaker 1: those might interact with ourselves in such a way as 651 00:40:30,080 --> 00:40:32,719 Speaker 1: to be toxic. So we have to really research this 652 00:40:32,800 --> 00:40:36,759 Speaker 1: before we start making practical applications of nanotechnology, particularly in 653 00:40:36,800 --> 00:40:40,799 Speaker 1: the medical field. We're still years, if not decades, or 654 00:40:40,840 --> 00:40:44,960 Speaker 1: maybe centuries away from building nanoscale assemblers, but we're taking 655 00:40:45,000 --> 00:40:48,320 Speaker 1: advantage of stuff on the nanoscale all the time. For example, 656 00:40:48,360 --> 00:40:52,200 Speaker 1: you've probably heard about carbon nanotubes, a truly interesting material 657 00:40:52,280 --> 00:40:56,640 Speaker 1: that we have in fact made without knowing it for centuries. 658 00:40:57,040 --> 00:41:00,560 Speaker 1: This stuff helps illustrate how different things can be on 659 00:41:00,600 --> 00:41:04,080 Speaker 1: the nanoscale, though I guess again we shouldn't be surprised. 660 00:41:04,320 --> 00:41:07,319 Speaker 1: So carbon is plentiful stuff, and it can take lots 661 00:41:07,320 --> 00:41:09,960 Speaker 1: of different forms. The two examples that you always hear 662 00:41:10,000 --> 00:41:13,120 Speaker 1: about are it's the stuff that's in pencil lead, and 663 00:41:13,120 --> 00:41:16,640 Speaker 1: it's also the stuff that's inside diamonds. The arrangement of 664 00:41:16,680 --> 00:41:20,160 Speaker 1: carbon atoms determines the properties of the stuff at macro scale. 665 00:41:20,239 --> 00:41:22,480 Speaker 1: But it sure does seem wild to think that the 666 00:41:22,560 --> 00:41:24,719 Speaker 1: same thing that's soft enough to serve as a way 667 00:41:24,760 --> 00:41:27,799 Speaker 1: to write stuff down on paper can also be an 668 00:41:27,800 --> 00:41:31,080 Speaker 1: incredibly hard substance capable of cutting through lots of other 669 00:41:31,160 --> 00:41:34,520 Speaker 1: stuff just by rearranging the way the atoms bind with 670 00:41:34,560 --> 00:41:38,200 Speaker 1: each other. So what's the carbon nanotube. Well, you can 671 00:41:38,239 --> 00:41:41,880 Speaker 1: start off with a sheet of carbon atoms just one 672 00:41:42,000 --> 00:41:44,799 Speaker 1: atom thick, So think of it as a very thin 673 00:41:44,920 --> 00:41:47,480 Speaker 1: blanket made up of carbon atoms that are linked together 674 00:41:47,520 --> 00:41:51,920 Speaker 1: in a hexagonal pattern. We call this graphene. Now you 675 00:41:52,040 --> 00:41:54,560 Speaker 1: roll up this graphing into a tube and you get 676 00:41:54,600 --> 00:41:57,399 Speaker 1: yourself a carbon nanotube. But here's a really cool part. 677 00:41:57,840 --> 00:42:01,759 Speaker 1: The direction in which you roll this material determines the 678 00:42:01,840 --> 00:42:04,640 Speaker 1: properties of the tube. So again, think of it like 679 00:42:04,680 --> 00:42:06,719 Speaker 1: a blanket. If you were to roll it from top 680 00:42:06,760 --> 00:42:09,560 Speaker 1: to bottom, you would get one set of properties, but 681 00:42:09,560 --> 00:42:11,880 Speaker 1: if you were to roll it on the diagonal, it 682 00:42:11,880 --> 00:42:15,520 Speaker 1: would be a different set of properties. So carbon nanotubes 683 00:42:15,560 --> 00:42:18,480 Speaker 1: can be really strong but extremely light weight, So a 684 00:42:18,520 --> 00:42:20,160 Speaker 1: lot of folks hope that it could be the secret 685 00:42:20,160 --> 00:42:23,360 Speaker 1: to some really phenomenal technology in the future. For example, 686 00:42:23,560 --> 00:42:27,200 Speaker 1: in the space industry, getting a really high strength, low 687 00:42:27,239 --> 00:42:30,120 Speaker 1: weight material is incredibly helpful. You needed to be strong 688 00:42:30,200 --> 00:42:32,560 Speaker 1: enough to withstand, you know, the rigors of launching stuff 689 00:42:32,560 --> 00:42:34,640 Speaker 1: into space, and you also have to remember this space 690 00:42:34,719 --> 00:42:38,480 Speaker 1: is always, always, always trying to kill you. But you 691 00:42:38,640 --> 00:42:41,479 Speaker 1: also want the material to be really light weight because 692 00:42:41,560 --> 00:42:44,120 Speaker 1: that reduces the amount of energy you need to get 693 00:42:44,160 --> 00:42:47,120 Speaker 1: the darn stuff off Earth in the first place. Carbon 694 00:42:47,200 --> 00:42:50,360 Speaker 1: nanotubes have been suggested as a possible material for a 695 00:42:50,520 --> 00:42:54,440 Speaker 1: tether for a space elevator. The space elevator concept is 696 00:42:54,520 --> 00:42:57,440 Speaker 1: kind of trippy. Essentially, you've got a weight or technically 697 00:42:57,440 --> 00:43:00,799 Speaker 1: a counterweight, like maybe a space station, and it's out 698 00:43:00,840 --> 00:43:03,879 Speaker 1: in space and it's tethered to the Earth that has 699 00:43:03,960 --> 00:43:07,880 Speaker 1: anchored somewhere along the equator of the Earth, and this 700 00:43:08,000 --> 00:43:11,560 Speaker 1: counterweight the space station would be way out beyond geo 701 00:43:11,600 --> 00:43:15,479 Speaker 1: stationary orbit. That is, way the heck out there. Geo 702 00:43:15,520 --> 00:43:19,840 Speaker 1: stationary orbit is around thirty six thousand kilometers the the 703 00:43:19,880 --> 00:43:23,319 Speaker 1: International Space Station is just at four hundred eight kilometers, 704 00:43:23,680 --> 00:43:27,200 Speaker 1: so we're really talking deep out there. But the idea 705 00:43:27,200 --> 00:43:30,040 Speaker 1: is that the centrifugal force on the tether would be 706 00:43:30,080 --> 00:43:33,319 Speaker 1: equaled by the gravitational pull on the tether, and you 707 00:43:33,320 --> 00:43:36,080 Speaker 1: would end up with a taught cable that could go 708 00:43:36,200 --> 00:43:39,080 Speaker 1: up to the stars or at least out into a 709 00:43:39,120 --> 00:43:42,320 Speaker 1: far orbit, and an elevator would be able to climb 710 00:43:42,480 --> 00:43:46,239 Speaker 1: that cable, delivering payloads out into space without ever having 711 00:43:46,320 --> 00:43:49,000 Speaker 1: to load it onto a rocket and blast the stuff 712 00:43:49,120 --> 00:43:53,759 Speaker 1: up there. Now, there are a lot of engineering challenges 713 00:43:53,880 --> 00:43:57,360 Speaker 1: in the way of ever realizing this technology here on Earth, 714 00:43:57,760 --> 00:44:00,120 Speaker 1: among them finding material strong enough to with stay and 715 00:44:00,200 --> 00:44:03,359 Speaker 1: the crazy amount of force it would be under. Some 716 00:44:03,400 --> 00:44:06,919 Speaker 1: folks hope that carbon nanotubes could be the answer to that. 717 00:44:06,920 --> 00:44:11,360 Speaker 1: That's just one tiny example pun intended of a possible 718 00:44:11,400 --> 00:44:15,759 Speaker 1: application for nanotechnology, but one that's really still far off 719 00:44:15,760 --> 00:44:17,680 Speaker 1: in the future. If it's a you know, at all 720 00:44:17,719 --> 00:44:21,680 Speaker 1: a possibility, but In the meantime, countless scientists are learning 721 00:44:21,719 --> 00:44:24,879 Speaker 1: more about what happens on the very small scale, which 722 00:44:24,920 --> 00:44:27,279 Speaker 1: is great because it extends our knowledge about how the 723 00:44:27,360 --> 00:44:30,400 Speaker 1: universe works, and it also gives us the opportunity to 724 00:44:30,520 --> 00:44:35,600 Speaker 1: leverage that knowledge and fields like chemistry, medicine, material science, 725 00:44:35,640 --> 00:44:40,560 Speaker 1: and robotics. Nanotechnology plays an important role, just not one 726 00:44:40,600 --> 00:44:43,360 Speaker 1: in which we have very teeny tiny robots building stuff 727 00:44:43,400 --> 00:44:47,279 Speaker 1: atom by atom. We have done some molecular manipulation on 728 00:44:47,280 --> 00:44:50,880 Speaker 1: that scale, but it's been far more meticulous and human 729 00:44:50,960 --> 00:44:54,200 Speaker 1: controlled than the sci Fi scenario. Now, all of this 730 00:44:54,280 --> 00:44:56,600 Speaker 1: is to say that a lot of the technologies that 731 00:44:56,640 --> 00:45:01,040 Speaker 1: are marketed as nanotech are at best mis leading. I've 732 00:45:01,040 --> 00:45:04,480 Speaker 1: seen robots that have been called nano robots, and they're 733 00:45:04,520 --> 00:45:08,920 Speaker 1: pretty small, but they're not even crossing the micron threshold, 734 00:45:09,320 --> 00:45:12,160 Speaker 1: let alone the nano scale, so I think that's not 735 00:45:12,239 --> 00:45:15,759 Speaker 1: really terribly accurate. There have been some interesting sensors and 736 00:45:15,880 --> 00:45:19,279 Speaker 1: switches and things that are on the nano scale that 737 00:45:19,680 --> 00:45:23,360 Speaker 1: you could argue fit into nano robotics, although it doesn't 738 00:45:23,400 --> 00:45:26,640 Speaker 1: necessarily match what we classically think of as a robot, 739 00:45:27,239 --> 00:45:31,520 Speaker 1: but it's still closer at least than these small but 740 00:45:31,760 --> 00:45:35,440 Speaker 1: not you know, microscopic robots that I see marketed as 741 00:45:35,520 --> 00:45:38,120 Speaker 1: nanobots all the time. I'm sure I'm gonna do a 742 00:45:38,200 --> 00:45:42,400 Speaker 1: lot more episodes about nanotechnology, including specific implementations. I mean, 743 00:45:42,440 --> 00:45:44,840 Speaker 1: I didn't even get into Bucky balls in this episode, 744 00:45:44,880 --> 00:45:46,359 Speaker 1: so you know, I've got to come back to it 745 00:45:47,000 --> 00:45:50,040 Speaker 1: in the meantime. If you have suggestions for future episodes 746 00:45:50,080 --> 00:45:53,600 Speaker 1: of tech Stuff, whether it's a specific technology, a company, 747 00:45:53,640 --> 00:45:56,520 Speaker 1: a person in tech, maybe just a trend, let me know. 748 00:45:56,719 --> 00:45:59,440 Speaker 1: Reach out to me on Twitter or Facebook the handle 749 00:45:59,440 --> 00:46:02,160 Speaker 1: for both of those as text Stuff H s W 750 00:46:02,640 --> 00:46:10,439 Speaker 1: and I'll talk to you again really soon. Y. Text 751 00:46:10,440 --> 00:46:13,920 Speaker 1: Stuff is an I Heart Radio production. For more podcasts 752 00:46:13,920 --> 00:46:16,680 Speaker 1: from I Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, 753 00:46:16,840 --> 00:46:20,000 Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.