Nanorobots coming: goodbye scarcity, hello healthier, longer lives

By Dick Pelletier

      

    Whether you believe it will become reality, or think it's just too bizarre to be true, this most hyped science of all time – nanorobots – promises a utopian future with scarcity-free lifestyles for everyone on the planet, and healthcare miracles that could one day push human lifespan to the edge of immortality.

    To achieve this remarkable future, scientists must first create a tiny microscopic-size machine called a fabricator that can grasp individual atoms and molecules and form them into objects. Futurists at the Center for Responsible Nanotechnology believe that the first fabricator will be developed by early 2020s.

    The next step is to build a Star Trek-like replicator called a nanofactory with billions of fabricators inside. These machines, which experts predict will arrive within months after the development of fabricators, will sit on countertops; and guided by Internet-delivered software, will select atoms from supplied chemicals or household waste products and turn them into essentials, like food, medicine, clothing, or appliances.

    The following link shows an artist's vision of a nanofactory as it moves blocks of atoms to build a billion-cpu laptop computer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEYN18d7gHg.

    Nanofactories will eventually replace most human labor and will vastly decrease manufacturing costs, making consumer goods plentiful, cheaper, and better quality. On voice command, requested products would exit the machine in minutes. Think Star Trek's Captain Picard; "Computer; tea, Earl Grey, hot."

    Even Third World families will find nanofactories affordable, as these machines can copy themselves at little-to-no cost. In Revolutionary Wealth, Alvin and Heidi Toffler argue that we are on the verge of a post-scarcity time that will alleviate most of today's poverty. Supporting this view, futurist Steve Burgess in a recent blog predicts that in the 2030s, nanofactories will launch an unprecedented era of global wealth.

    Although creating low cost goods will reduce poverty, the best use for nanorobots may lie in healthcare.

    Most sickness, injury, and stress can be traced to cell issues; but today's doctors cannot treat individual cells. In addition, many current medical techniques carry bad side effects. Surgery saves lives, but it also causes trauma. Chemotherapy kills cancer, but healthy cells are destroyed; and the cancer often returns.

    Enter nanotech. Today, in clinical trials, doctors are injecting nanoparticles that target and destroy cancer cells without harming other tissues. In fact, after seeing nanotech's huge potential, a former NCI director predicted that all cancer deaths would be eliminated by 2015. It may not be cured by then, he said, but new drugs will be available to end the suffering, pain, and death that cancer now dishes out.

    Forward thinkers believe that among the first products produced in nanofactories will be medical nanorobots; machines the size of bacterium, with gears, sensors, motors, gripping tools, onboard computers, and propulsion systems. Doctors will use these computerized 'bots as "cell repair" machines.

    In a recent Futurist Magazine interview, nanomedicine expert Robert Freitas describes a procedure for a type of medical nanorobot called a chromallocyte. Controlled by doctors, this specialized robot would extract chromosomes from a diseased cell and insert new ones in their place. This process is called chromosome replacement therapy. The new chromosomes would be built inexpensively in nanofactories.

    Inherited defective genes could be replaced with nondefective base-pair sequences, erasing all genetic diseases. Nanorobots would approach the target, enter its nucleus and replace worn out genes with new chromosomes. Doctors could also direct these 'bots to transform cancer cells into non-cancerous states.

    Incredible as all this may sound, chromosome replacement therapy will not only repair damages caused by aging; but would also eradicate any disease in the patient's body that might cause death. And with annual treatments, this therapy could keep one's biological age at a constant level; say goodbye to aging.

    Patients would enjoy perfect health and youthful vitality indefinitely. Experts predict these procedures could appear in clinical trials in developed countries by early 2030s, the rest of the world shortly after.

    Will this amazing nanorobot future unfold at such a rapid pace? Positive futurists believe that it will.

This article appeared in various print publications and on-line blogs. Comments always welcome.