From this week’s reading, I found the idea of self-assembly to be of particular interest. I am interested in the link between man-made structures and nature. I went online to research self-assembly, and found that Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has a research lab dedicated to it called the Self-Assembly Lab. This lab is headed by Skylar Tibbits, whose work we were introduced to in class this week, and whose writing about self-assembly we read as part of our homework. According to the Self-Assembly Lab, “Self-Assembly is a process by which disordered parts build an ordered structure through local interaction.” I am very interested in the work this lab is doing, in particular, the issue of energy as it relates to self-assembly. Traditional energy methods are unsustainable, so engineering assembly to be fueled by nature is the most sound and responsible route to go.
I find this energy movement is reflected not only in nanotechnology and self-assembly, but seen socially as well. Sustainability takes place on a small scale in our daily lives. One excellent example of this is the adoption of energy-efficient LED light bulbs. The traditional 60W incandescent light bulb costs about $4.80 to power annually. In comparison, a 12W LED bulb only costs $1.00 over the same period of time, and uses 75%-80% less energy. Waste is also reduced with these bulbs, which last for 25,000 hours compared to the incandescent’s life of 1000 hours.
Sustainability is being taken further and further in mainstream culture. The idea of living “off the grid” is becoming increasingly popular for ecological and financial reasons. An excellent example of this is the house Alex Porter built in Maine for her father. This building is an example of a “tiny house”, the term used for micro-homes that use fewer materials and cost substantially less to build that traditional houses. Alex’s house is entirely off the grid, relying solely on the sun for energy. It uses a rainwater collection system to supply the home with water, and a composting toilet to eliminate the need for sewage.
I find it interesting that so much goes into energy efficiency, even on the nano scale, and that advances in nanotechnology can be seen in parallel with advances in common life.
Works Cited
"The Best LED Light Bulbs of 2015 | Top Ten Reviews." TopTenREVIEWS. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Sept. 2015.
"How Energy-Efficient Light Bulbs Compare with Traditional Incandescents." How Energy-Efficient Light Bulbs Compare with Traditional Incandescents. Energy.gov, n.d. Web. 26 Sept. 2015.
Michler, Andrew. "Tiny Off-Grid Cabin in Maine Is Completely Self-Sustaining." Inhabitat Sustainable Design Innovation Eco Architecture Green Building Tiny OffGrid Cabin in Maine Is Completely SelfSustaining Comments. N.p., 20 Mar. 2014. Web. 26 Sept. 2015.
"Self-Assembly Lab." Self-Assembly Lab. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, n.d. Web. 26 Sept. 2015.
"What Is The Tiny House Movement?" The Tiny Life. The Tiny Life, 31 Aug. 2009. Web. 26 Sept. 2015.
I found Richard P. Feynman’s talk at California Institute of Technology in 1959 to be very interesting and an eerie prophesy when read in 2015. He makes many points about creating information and machines that are smaller, and there is much that he speculated about that is seen today in one form or another.
In particular, I found his point about information becoming smaller to be interesting. His vision of books being pressed into very tiny surfaces and being viewed with microscopes seems almost silly when we look at how information is stored today.
The first commercially available hard drive to measure its storage capacity in gigabytes was the IBM 3380, first released in 1980. Its capacity, which at the time was groundbreaking, was a measly 2.5 GB. Today, hard drives are an essential mode of storage, with personal hard drives often holding one or two terabytes of data.
And as far as modern equivalents go, today’s 8 GB flash drives, which are some of the smaller drives currently available, are small enough to fit on our key chains, and weigh less than two ounces. The IBM 3380 was anything but travel size, and weighed over 500 pounds. So while we do not use Feynman’s ideas of imprinting books on the heads of pins as a practical storage system, he was correct in speculating that the future was going to revolve around mankind’s information taking up less space.
I also found his comment about Albert R. Hibbs’ ideas about robots and cameras in surgery to be interesting. He referred to it as “a very wild idea”, but in 2015, it is far from that. Laparoscopic surgery is commonly used today. It involves using multiple small incisions to accomplish a surgery with small tools and cameras, without the need to large incisions for hands and traditional tools. While we do not have robotic surgeons moving through our bloodstream, we have robotic surgery options, such as the da Vinci Surgical System. This system uses robotics to accomplish surgeries that are minimally invasive, and these types of surgeries are nearly impossible to imagine in 1959.
The ideas that Feynman brought up during his talk may have seemed far-fetched at the time, but many of his ideas are considered a standard part of modern life.
Works Cited
"The Da Vinci® Surgical System." Da Vinci Surgery. Intuitive Surgical, Inc., Apr. 2013. Web. 19 Sept. 2015. Kovar, Joseph F. "The History Of The Hard Drive And Its Future." CRN. CRN, 20 Dec. 2012. Web. 19 Sept. 2015. Lexar. "Lexar JumpDrive TwistTurn 64GB USB Flash Drive LJDTT64GASBNA (Black)." Amazon.com: : Electronics. Amazon, n.d. Web. 19 Sept. 2015.
"Robot-assisted Laparoscopic Surgery Using the Da Vinci System." Robot Assisted Laparoscopic Surgery the Da Vinci System. USC Center for Pancreatic and Biliary Diseases, n.d. Web. 19 Sept. 2015. "WHAT IS LAPAROSCOPIC SURGERY." What Is Laparoscopic Surgery? USC Center for Pancreatic and Biliary Diseases, n.d. Web. 19 Sept. 2015.
