The need for an Indian nanotech initiative - Science for the citizen

The need for an Indian Nanotech Initiative

By

Sharad Bailur

For the last couple of years we have been hearing increasingly strident utterances of India awakening and taking the world by the scruff of its neck with its mighty software muscle miraculously developed overnight so to speak; of India becoming a world power, of the 21^st Century belonging to India. And yet after spending hundreds of crores over decades we are not able to develop a tank for the army. We have spent thousands of crores on the LCA and now we are told that we cannot expect it to go into combat duty for another 20 years. And, by then, it will be obsolete. Yet there is no doubting our software capabilities. These can be put to unprecedented use as we shall see.

Something much more important

This is what President Clinton said In a speech at the California Institute of Technology on January 21^st 2000: "My budget supports a major new National Nanotechnology Initiative, worth $500 million… the ability to manipulate matter at the atomic and molecular level. Imagine the possibilities: materials with ten times the strength of steel and only a small fraction of the weight -- shrinking all the information housed at the Library of Congress into a device the size of a sugar cube -- detecting cancerous tumors when they are only a few cells in size. Some of our research goals may take 20 or more years to achieve, but that is precisely why there is an important role for the federal government."

What is needed is for us to leapfrog into something similar. We should be concentrating on a Nanotech Initiative of our own.

What is Nanotechnology or Molecular Engineering?

The Nanotech Initiative of the US Government which began with the speech given by President Clinton in January last year has resulted from a lot of work in the field that has gone before it. Now let us see what nanotechnology or molecular engineering is.

Ralph Merkle, Fellow at Zyvex Corporation says: "The central objective of molecular manufacturing is the design, modelling, and manufacture of systems that can inexpensively fabricate most products that can be specified in molecular detail. This would include, for example, molecular logic elements connected in complex patterns to form molecular computers, molecular robotic arms or Stewart platforms (e.g., positional devices) able to position individual atoms or clusters of atoms under programmatic control (useful if we wish to make molecular computers and other molecular manufacturing systems), and a wide range of other molecular devices. A central concept for achieving low cost in molecular manufacturing is that of a self-replicating manufacturing system, e.g., a general purpose manufacturing device able to build (among other things) another general purpose manufacturing device. Such systems are at present theoretical, but should revolutionise 21^st century manufacturing. The marginal manufacturing costs for such systems should be quite small, although initial R&D costs might be high.”

In a testimony before the Senate Committee on Science and Technology, Prof. Merkle said: “For centuries manufacturing methods have become more precise, less expensive, and more flexible. In the next few decades, we will approach the limits of these trends. The limit of precision is the ability to get every atom where we want it. The limit of low cost is set by the cost of the raw materials and the energy involved in manufacture. The limit of flexibility is the ability to arrange atoms in all the patterns permitted by physical law.”

“Most scientists agree we will approach these limits but differ about how best to proceed, on what nanotechnology will look like, and on how long it will take to develop. Much of this disagreement is caused by the simple fact that, collectively, we have only recently agreed that the goal is feasible and we have not yet sorted out the issues that this creates. This process of creating a greater shared understanding both of the goals of nanotechnology and the routes for achieving those goals is the most important result of today's research.”

“Nanotechnology…will let us make remarkably powerful molecular computers. It

will let us make materials over fifty times lighter than steel or aluminium alloy but with the same strength. We'll be able to make jets, rockets, cars or even chairs that, by today's standards, would be remarkably light, strong, and inexpensive. Molecular surgical tools, guided by molecular computers and injected into the blood stream could find and destroy cancer cells or invading bacteria, unclog arteries, or provide oxygen when the circulation is impaired.”

“Nanotechnology will replace our entire manufacturing base with a new, radically more precise, radically less expensive, and radically more flexible way of making products. The aim is not simply to replace today's computer chip making plants, but also to replace the assembly lines for cars, televisions, telephones, books, surgical tools, missiles, bookcases, aeroplanes, tractors, and all the rest. The objective is a pervasive change in manufacturing, a change that will leave virtually no product untouched. Economic progress and military readiness in the 21st Century will depend fundamentally on maintaining a competitive position in nanotechnology.”

“We know self replication can inexpensively make complex products with great precision: cells are programmed by DNA to replicate and make complex systems – including giant redwoods, wheat, whales, birds, pumpkins and more. We should likewise be able to develop artificial programmable self replicating molecular machine systems -- also known as assemblers -- able to make a wide range of products from graphite, diamond, and other non-biological materials. The first groups to develop assemblers will have a historic window for economic, military, and environmental impact.” (Italics, mine)

“Developing nanotechnology will be a major project -- just as developing nuclear weapons or lunar rockets were major projects. We must first focus our efforts on developing two things: the tools with which to build the first molecular machines, and the blueprints of what we are to build. This will require the co-operative efforts of researchers across a wide range of disciplines: scanning probe microscopy, supramolecular chemistry, protein engineering, self-assembly, robotics, materials science, computational chemistry, self replicating systems, physics, computer science, and more. This work must focus on fundamentally new approaches and methods: incremental or evolutionary improvements will not be sufficient. Government funding is both appropriate and essential for several reasons: the benefits will be pervasive across companies and the economy; few if any companies will have the resources to pursue this alone; and development will take many years to a few decades (beyond the planning horizon of most private organisations).”

Building Upwards with Atoms

When we conventionally manufacture something it goes something like this: We chop down a tree and shape planks out of the chopped wood. We then shape the planks to make the table on which the computer, on which this article is being written, sits. A lot of energy gets used in the process and there is a lot of waste wood. If instead we had a machine that could “deconstruct” the table by analyzing what it is exactly made of down to its last atoms, store that information in digital form as software and then replicate the entire process with atoms of carbon, hydrogen (by splitting water vapour) and oxygen collected from the air it should be possible, using just the atoms of the air, to make a table identical to the one made by the old process. There would be no difference between the old table and its nano-engineered clone. And we could make millions of them. Likewise it should be possible to make unlimited quantities of anything that we can think of today and much that will be possible that we have not even thought of. That includes unlimited quantities of gold, diamonds, food, clothing and shelter. A disaster like the Columbia burnout is impossible because the entire spaceship would be nano-engineered one atom at a time. There will be no weaknesses. Therefore no structural failures. Hence no burnouts.

There is Plenty of Room at the Bottom

It started with an innocuous speech given by Nobel Prize winning Physicist Richard Feynman in 1959 in which he said, ”There is plenty of room at the bottom”. In that speech he demonstrated that it was possible if the manipulation of single atoms could be brought about to miniaturize manufactured goods to such an extent that a motor the size of a pinhead could be manufactured. Sure enough within a year a student of his won the thousand dollar bet he had laid and made a motor the size of a pinhead. This did not really amount to nano-engineering as will be seen. And as it happened nobody took Feynman seriously. He was, as is well known, famous for his practical jokes.

There is as great a difference between miniaturizing something to microscopic proportions and making them to atomic scale as there is a difference between a thumbnail and a twenty storey tall building. By Nanotech or Molecular Engineering, what is meant is the manipulation of individual atoms to build from the bottom upwards to manufacture virtually anything that can be thought of and much that is today not even thought of.

Brownian Motion and Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle

When at first such an idea was mooted by Dr Eric Drexler in 1985 in his book, Engines of Creation, it came up against two obvious scientific barriers quite apart from the technology of it. One was Brownian Motion and the other was the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. Brownian Motion states that atoms are never still. This is evident when we instill a drop of ink into a glass of water. It gradually disappears. The molecules of water moving around are responsible for the dispersal of the ink. How do you manipulate something that is constantly moving? And how do you make it stay still even if you do? Heisenberg’s principle states that you can either predict the position of atoms or you can predict their speed – you cannot, with any accuracy, predict both. There is therefore only a statistical probability that you will find anything. Clearly this meant that you could not manipulate atoms. Then again, anything used to manipulate them would itself be made of atoms. Lastly who has seen atoms?

Then came the invention of the Scanning Tunneling Microscope. With its help it became possible not just to see individual atoms at temperatures hundreds of degrees below freezing, it also became possible to manipulate them, to begin with, by just pushing them around on a flat surface. The first such crude manipulation was carried out by IBM the American multinational computer giant some ten years ago in an experiment in which it arranged atoms of xenon in a pattern that spelt “IBM”.

But When?

Since then there have been a number of developments in the field which increases confidence in the prediction that Molecular Engineering will be a reality not in our grandchildren’s life time but most probably in that of most of those of you reading this article. The August 1995 issue of Wired magazine (page 58) had estimates by five experts (all Ph.D.'s). They are:

· Robert Birge, Distinguished Professor of Chemistry, and Director of the W. M. Keck Centre for Electronics, Syracuse University.

· Donald W. Brenner, Associate Professor, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, North Carolina State University.

· K. Eric Drexler, Chairman, Foresight Institute and author of Engines of Creation and Nanosystems: molecular machinery, manufacturing, and computation.

· J. Storrs Hall, Computer Scientist, Rutger’s University and the moderator of sci. nanotech.

· Richard E. Smalley, Professor of Chemistry and Physics, Rice University, and chief instigator of Rice's widely respected Centre for Nanoscale Science and Technology. Smalley incidentally won the Nobel four years ago.

It is quite likely that the magazine, in its enthusiasm, avoided mentioning the caveats with which such dates are invariably surrounded. However it does offer indications from some of the best qualified people in the field:

Birge Brenner Drexler Hall Smalley

Molecular Assembler: 2005 2025 2015 2010 2000

Nanocomputer: 2040 2040 2017 2010 2100

Cell Repair: 2030 2035 2018 2050 2010

Commercial product: 2002 2000 2015 2005 2000

Nanotech laws: 1998 2036 2015 1995 2000

Research is now on to devise motors with strands of DNA which will hitch a ride on bacteria and use their energy to travel through the blood stream and reach specific sites in the human body to destroy cancer cells, or clean out cholesterol caused plaque or deliver medicine with pinpoint accuracy.

Among the latest developments is the invention of a “tweezer” made of buckminsterfullerene or buckytubes that can be used to manipulate individual atoms. Until now it was possible to merely push atoms around and place them approximately where one desired. Now the tweezers can lift individual atoms and place them with atomic precision. With this as a first crude step, it should be possible eventually to build anything up from its atomic structure upwards, from chairs and tables to a steaming plate of food complete with juicy pieces of meat and the heavenly aroma of spices. For the first time, vegetarians will have the pleasure of eating any kind of food since it will all be atomically constructed and there will be no need to kill animals for it.

Implications

This possible future development has enormous implications for the world as we know it. Economics is a science of scarce means used to satisfy unlimited ends. Since the means to satisfy ends will become unlimited, Economics will have outlived its utility and will be given a hasty quietus. There will be no need of currency since everyone will be able to make anything – just anything - from gold to diamonds and as much of it as he likes. They will therefore have no value. All that will be needed will be to “deconstruct” into digital form to atomic level one piece of whatever you want to replicate from kanjeevaram sarees to a jet plane to the finest Darjeeling tea and then let the software and the Assembler take over. You could make a million such sarees if it pleased you or a million tons of gold.

It will astoundingly give off more energy than it will consume in the manufacture. This means that there will be no shortage of electricity. Everything will be made just so. It will be possible to make things which have unbelievable durability unless they are willfully deconstructed. Since it will be made from the assembly of atoms upwards there will be no pollution in the manufacture. And no waste. In other words it will be possible to effectively banish hunger and discomfort of any kind, disease and even the need to do any kind of work for a living since the Assembler can be made to do it all. What happens to society when anything and everything is available to everybody and as much of it as he wishes? In a few decades it will have profound implications even on politics. What happens to all that oil sitting beneath the sands of Arabia, when there is no use for it any more?

At first sight therefore it appears that this scientific development will be the holy grail of bringing heaven down to earth, an objective that has been the aim of all of mankind’s efforts for the last so many thousands of years since civilisation as we know it, began. Fantasy? Science fiction? Yes. I thought so too, at first. Till I went deeper into the available sources of information.

The Harm that good men do

Molecular Engineering and nanotechnology, like any other scientific development is double edged and therefore has the enormous potential to also do harm. We have to be soberly aware that humans get pleasure in hurting other humans. We get even greater pleasure in keeping other humans deprived. If humans can make computer viruses to destroy programmes all over the world just for kicks, they can create nanoscale machines that can be set free to tyrannise the rest of mankind in a grip far worse than any yet invented, made possible by the very nature of nanotechnology, also just for kicks. Or some other more “concerned citizen of this world”, could set free such nanomachines to destroy the world.

On a more practical and immediate note, among the nations of the world who, like the United States, have taken up the challenge of nanotechnology and molecular engineering are Japan, China, Taiwan, Singapore and the developed nations of Europe. India is very quickly catching up with the rest of the world and has the potential to become a software superpower in the near future. Since software is at the heart of Molecular Engineering it would seem that we will be missing an enormous opportunity to leapfrog into a nanotech future if we do not take up a national initiative on the lines taken up by the United States immediately. Perhaps this will be the last chance that India will ever have to redeem what it regards as its greatness in the comity of nations, especially in view of Prof Merkle’s remark to the Senate Committee: “The first groups to develop assemblers will have a historic window for economic, military, and environmental impact.” It is time therefore that the Prime Minister announces in Parliament the taking up of such an initiative.

At a conference which I recently attended in Hyderabad, no one seemed to have any idea about Nanotechnology or Molecular Engineering and its potential for a country like India. The first immediate step is for scientists in India to be aware of what Nanotechnology Molecular Engineering is all about. And yet an Indian from near Delhi and his Chinese wife have invented a way to compress a computer chip to nano-size. It is time our IITs took molecular engineering seriously. Since it involves software for nano-machinery, cutting edge research by organizations like Infosys would come in useful.

For starters I would suggest that readers, especially interested scientists, should go to the website of the Foresight Institute (http://www.foresight.org). Another site that will give immense information and especially one that will dispel any remaining doubts about its feasibility is http://www.zyvex.com, while Japan has a website of immense value (http://www.atip.org) to specifically deal with Asian concerns.