Nanotechnology conquers the world

ASEE Prism, Mar 2003

BRIEFINGS

Eleven years ago, two eminent scientists-Doyne Farmer and Alletta Belinwarned that humans will eventually design and create a new class of organisms that will be able to reproduce and evolve. For all intents and purposes, these organisms "will be 'alive' under any reasonable definition of the word." They cautioned that the impact of these critters on society and our planet could be "larger than the industrial revolution, nuclear weapons, or environmental pollution." Famed sci-fi writer Michael Crichton-the physician-turned-author who's penned such blockbusters as Jurassic Park and The Andromeda Strain-- takes that concept and runs with it, as usual, all the way to the bank. His latest megaseller, Prey, is based on the chilling notion that when nanotechnology, biotechnology, and computer science merge, the result could be technology run amok. It's a cautionary tale of what could happen if cutting-edge science is tainted by corporate greed and human hubris. His menace in Prey are clouds -swarms actually-of microparticles that are the odious offspring of the marriage of the three aforementioned disciplines. And it's also a real page-turner that still manages to be a basic primer on those technologies.

Nanotechnology is the craft of manufacturing machines at the nanoscale, machines that are 1,000 times tinier than the diameter of a human hair. And Prey's basic premise is this: Xymos Technology, a Silicon Valley company with a fabrication plant in the no-man's-land of the Nevada desert, is working on a Pentagon project to create a swarm of nanoparticles that can be an eve in the sky. Each of the particles is a teeny-weeny camera, but as they swarm together, they network and form one larger flying camera that can't be shot down by enemy firepower. The nanocameras communicate with one another using agent-based algorithms, or distributed processing. As Crichton points out, when birds flock or ants forage, it's the combined intelligence of dozens or hundreds or thousands of small brains that allow them to function, and to function without any leadership. This socalled "emergent behavior" occurs even though it's not programmed into any member of the group. Agent-based programming is a hot field these days because the mimicking of successful biological populations-like ants or termites-can have real-world applications, like controlling big communications networks.

Prey explains that the problem with trying to build molecules from scratch is time. So complex is one molecule, Crichton writes, that it would take human manufacturers 3,000 trillion year: to build it. Not exactly feasible-even with lots of overtime. It's expected the eventual solution will be nano-assemblers-super-miniature machines that will build molecules. That's a solution, however, that's probably decades away. Enter biotechnology. The book's fictitious company solves the problem by using bacteria-in this case, ubiquitous E. coli, which can feed on almost anything-to build the molecules. Writes Crichton, ". . . there wasn't much difference between creating a new bacteria to spit out, say, insulin molecules, and creating a human-made, micromechanical assembly to spit out new molecules."

Things go wrong for Prey's boffins when their swarm cameras fall apart in wind. As the Pentagon loses interest, and funding begins to dry up, Xymos executives and researchers-fearing for their livelihood-- panic and make some bad decisions. They code the molecules to have memory which means they can learn. They also give them the ability to self-replicate and run on solar power. They then release them into the environment to let them solve the wind problem on their own. Which they do. Trouble is, they continue to evolve. By the hour. And they evolve into something scary and deadly.

How feasible is Crichton's nano-thriller? Well, clearly scientists have already warned about the need to keep strict controls on these technologies. And Crichton, in an introduction to Prey, certainly makes clear his own concerns. Still, for the sake of having a story to tell, Crichton has his scientists-motivated by cutthroat corporate realpolitik-- give their nanobugs a combination of powers they don't really need. Would real scientists act so lamely? That's anybody's guess, but as we've seen in the last few years, corporate greed can surely seduce smart people into stupidity.

PREY

MICHAEL CRICHTON